The Rose and the Estuary
by Proudly Pinoy
Summary: When somebody close to Claire dies, while another is unconscious in the ICU, she is left with an unborn baby, and a group of detectives desperately trying to figure out exactly what happened. Complete
1. Storyteller

Author's note: All things Resident Evil, and whatever else that I couldn't possibly think up, are obviously not mine. Anyway, after a long break, I finally got back to writing as a means to waste my time. So, read, review, and hopefully enjoy.

**Resident Evil: "The Rose and the Estuary"**

**Prologue:**

Leon stared Chris at the face; his cheeks were red from both despair and hatred. A small handgun was trained at Chris' chest, with but only three paces separating the two men. "…Think about this Leon…you don't want to do this." Chris whispered, his palms out forward, as if that could help push the assailant away. Leon could hear the crack in the voice of the older man, something uncharacteristic of the strong, proud survivor that he knew. "…You're about to shoot a high ranking military official…" Chris continued, his back pressed against the edge of his mahogany desk. "…Fuck you." Leon responded, his voice brimming with pure emotion. "I don't care what you are…" He took a step forward, his hand was shaking, and he felt as if at anytime, he would just collapse from everything that has just happened to him.

"Leon don't do this…!"

"I trusted you! I trusted you, you motherfucker!"

_"Cue."_The sudden outburst was a distraction enough that Chris managed to grab Leon's hands and turn the gun away. A shot rang out, and a bullet flew by Chris' ear, breaking through a glass partition that led to the garden. With the vacuum still reverberating through his head, Chris slammed his knee across Leon's gut, consequently making the younger man let out a cry of discomfort. He then tried to wrestle the gun from Leon's hands, but the younger man seemed a lot stronger than Chris originally imagined. Three more shots were let loose, hitting the ceiling consecutively.

"Shit!" Chris shouted through gritted teeth, quickly adjusting himself. With his right hand still keeping the gun upward, he mover his left arm over Leon's right, so that Leon's right arm was adjacent to Chris' chest. Chris then pressed his left elbow down on Leon's right arm, which was trapped between Chris' arms, forcing the young man's arm to bend. With his right hand, Chris pushed the gun further down, while the left pulled at the same direction. Leon's eyes widened in horror as he saw the barrel of the gun drawing closer to his scalp, all the time Chris' figure loomed over him. If Leon would try to kick Chris away, he could still reach the trigger in time and blow a hole through Leon's head.

"Told you, you little sack of shit…" Chris whispered, his teeth still gritted. "…You'll always be half the man I am." He finished, as Leon was already tilting his neck to the right, hoping that only an ear could get blasted off if ever the gun did go off. "No…" Leon closed his eyes tight, and lashed out his leg right to Chris' crotch. As he expected, Chris' finger tightened around the crowded trigger, and the shot went off. Both men yelled as they fell down, opposite each other. "Son of a bitch!" Chris screamed at the top of his lungs as he clutched his groin. Leon couldn't even discern what the other man said, as he groaned in pain. He could feel the blood trickle down the side of his head. "Oh my God…" he whispered, as he felt a chunk of his ear go missing. The revolver was dropped right between the two recovering men, and their eyes instantly locked onto it. No backing down now. With loud cries, they lunged for the gun.

**Chapter 1: "Storyteller" **

Claire stared right past the senior police detective sitting across the room, and found nothing but a dark void. Her eyes were still tired from all the tears that were spent, and for whom, even she was not so certain. All she knew was that her eyes still hurt from crying, and that the creature she caressed in her belly felt like it could pull her down through the floor at any given moment. "…" Her beautiful white gown was stained by blood at the area of the stomach, and her constant caress kept on smearing it till it was a sick rusty color. "Can you tell us what happened?" The detective asked, her hands holding one another as she leaned on the stainless table. She was still young, with short blonde hair and a figure that most women would envy. "You can take all your time…but please remember that-"

"How is he?" she asked, cutting the detective in mid-speech.

"He's still in the ICU."

"Will he be fine?" Claire asked, her voice bordering between concern and anger, once again a thin line that she did not yet feel to elaborate.

"…We aren't sure yet…Ms. Redfield, but the faster you answer our questions, the faster that we can take you to where he is being held. "

"…"

"Ms. Redfield, someone of great service to this country was just killed, by a person whom you know intimately. We need to get to the bottom of this. This was no act of self-defense."

"…You know…it's funny."

"…Yes?"

"This all started right after that night…the night I told Leon how much I loved him."

"…"

"…Everyone knew that it was going to happen. I mean, him and me, we looked good. You'd think that when we…that it would be some fairytale ending."

"…"

"And it was supposed to be. That night…well…" she looked down onto her stomach, pressed her palms upon it once more, and smiled a sad, twisted smile. "I'm pregnant…first month… I'm going to be a mommy." She said, holding back the tears. "Ms. Redfield…I…don't really know what to say." The detective muttered, glancing at the two-way glass at the side of the room, pleading with her eyes to place her somewhere else.

Two figures stood motionless at the opposite end of the two-way mirror, watching both women in nervous silence. "…I don' we'll get anything out of her today." The younger of the two officers then muttered, crossing his arms over his chest. He was still young, barely his late twenties, but like the girl on the other side, he had his own share of the nightmare. "Aya's good at this, Kevin. Have a little faith." The commissioner then responded, prompting the young man to just nod back in response. Kevin turned and walked back to a desk, lazily sitting down and pushing back his mid-length brown hair with his cold hands. Whereas Kevin was the built, athletic, and handsome officer, the commissioner was the antithesis. He was old, tall, almost frail. But a lot of people regretted the day that they thought of him only as such, especially out in the field. Both of them wore suits and ties. "What's happening now?" he asked, not lifting his eyes from the dead steel table that he was leaning his elbows on. "…Aya's still trying to get her to talk." Responded the commissioner; his eyes were still glued to the two girls on the other end. "I wonder what she's thinking…" Kevin whispered, addressed to no one in particular.

_"Ah! Claire moaned in pleasure as she rode Leon, who too was getting carried away by the excitement. With greedy hands, he reached up and grabbed her breasts, caressing them incessantly as she squatted up and down. "Oh God, Claire…I'm gonna…!"_

"Claire?"

"Yes?" she snapped back to the present, finding detective Aya looking both puzzled and uncomfortable at the sweat and redness that flushed the woman's cheeks.

"Were you just…?"

"…? My mind must have been wandering…" Claire responded, pushing back a strand of hair that was caught on her brow.

"Listen, Claire…I have the utmost respect for you…for your brother…and for Leon. I want to know exactly what happened, so we can clear all this up, and hopefully you can…live normally again." There was clear sincerity in her voice, but she could not prevent a bit of impatience escape with her words.

"…Like I said, it all started when Leon and I…when we…" Claire closed her eyes, her mind flashing back, back to the beginning, where the light and the dark were not yet so entangled.

_"About two weeks ago, before all this… it was Sunday night…I waited to tell him…" _

_Claire smiled to herself in contentment as she lit the last few candles that were scattered on the dining table. Everything was perfect, the wine, the salad, the 'Air on a G String' gently playing on the stereo. How the soft melody helped calm her nerves in times of desperation was simply invaluable to her. The only thing more stunning than the set up was her, with her auburn hair falling gently down her shoulders, and a modest red dress that Leon gave her for a present._

_"I was nervous. I mean, who wouldn't be?"_

_Claire let out a nervous sigh as she heard a key set in, and consequently the doorknob turn and the door creak open. Leon stepped inside, his eyes darting all over the place. It didn't take long before a smile cracked from his tired face, and with taking off his brown sheepskin jacket, he then marched straight to the dining room. "Here we go…" Claire whispered to herself, as she finally saw the man she was waiting for stop at the doorway. He was always so handsome, no matter the stress, the unshaved chin, or the occasional blood splatter. He had on his lucky black turtleneck shirt, the one he had on in an incident involving the president's daughter. "…Wow." Leon uttered, as his eyes trailed to the table, and then to the woman that he cherished above everything else. "Come on…let's eat, then I'm going to tell you something very, very important." She coaxed, standing up to gently kiss him on the lips. "You bought me a Pontiac?" He playfully asked, sliding his hands across her waist. "No." she replied, gently pushing herself away. "Okay…then I'm ready for everything." Leon joked again, setting himself down on a chair._

_"I always loved the way he smiled. It was like…"_

"Wait." Aya broke Claire's reminiscing. "Pushed him away? As in forcefully?" She then asked, to which Claire quickly shook her head. "No, oh no…he was always gentle with…"

_"Oh God…Claire…harder!__ Harder!"_

"…Yes?" Aya asked, watching Claire once again wander off into her own little world.

"…Leon…he was always gentle with me." She finished, her eyes disconnecting with Aya's as she spoke.

"…Okay…please, go on then."

"…" A bitter smile crept up Claire's face as her eyes began to trail off into some distant land once again.

_"It was after dinner when I told him…my God, I was so nervous…" _

_Claire's heart stopped at the shock that took Leon, albeit lasting only a few seconds, she felt as if the anxiety of waiting for what he would respond could drown her. She held her stomach, smiling weakly. "We're going to have a baby." She said. Then as quickly as it came, all the dread, the fear was washed away, when Leon yelled out in loud cheer. Without warning, he took Claire in his arms in what could be the best embrace that both of them have ever felt. "You mean it? I'm going to be a father?" he asked her again, practically leaping for joy. "Yes…we'll be a family." Claire responded, tears welling in her eyes. She then felt his lips against hers, and for a moment, indeed she was happy. But only for a moment. _

_"I thought that…we could be happy." _

"Weren't you? We all saw you and Leon, you seemed so…perfect together." Aya then said, already becoming engrossed with the storyteller's words.

"…Sorry, but I really have to use the comfort room." Claire then said, looking much more uncomfortable then she already was. "…" Aya glanced at the two-way mirror, and then felt her mobile phone vibrate in response. "Alright." She said, standing up at the same time as Claire. "Officer Ryman will be with you…" she then declared, staring vengefully at the two-way mirror.

"What did I do? Hey!" Kevin whined as Aya smirked and turned to leave.

"There a problem?" The commissioner asked, raising a gray eyebrow.

"…I have a date."

"No you don't."

"I do!"

"Steer."

"I am not steering you!"

"Well, cancel you're date. You have a new one. And you'll be picking her up outside the comfort room the moment she finishes urinating, or throwing up, or whatever girls do."

"…I'm getting a raise."

"No you won't."

Claire looked at herself in the mirror, irritated at the fatigue that was etched on her once faultless features. With an aggravated sigh, she took out some foundation from her purse and began to powder her cheeks. She ignored the reflection of the shocked stare of a girl who emerged from a cubicle right behind her. She was used to the attention. Used to having people glance at her whenever she walked down a hall or drove around in a tap-down. In fact, deep down, she'd always be disappointed if the day ended without guys checking her out. Knowing all that, and knowing how much she degenerated overnight, then one can already imagine the level of disgust that Claire saw as she looked into the mirror. "…" Before being practically a celebrity, she never even cared for the way she looked. She was happy with herself, for who she was, for her strength as an independent female. But some things do change. Sudden glimpses into the life of pleasure and popularity corrupts as much as power could.

After tilting her face left and right to check for anything unsightly, she backed a step and returned her touch-ups to her purse. "…This is the ladies' room." She then uttered, before turning to her far left and finding officer Ryman standing by the doorway. "Yeah, but since you all have been lobbying for equality for such a long time…" He responded, noticing a girl stop behind him. With a wink, he let the girl pass into the room, before resuming his sentry like position. He already exchanged his earlier suit for his civilian clothes, which for him was infinitely more refreshing. A white shirt clung easily to his good physique, topped off by a gray, denim jacket. Everyone was into the vintage look.

"The commissioner asked me to be your personal bodyguard-"

"Don't need you." Claire cut him off before he could finish his statement.

"Yeah, well I don't care." Kevin then snapped back, catching the young woman off her guard.

"…You can't talk to me like-"

"Actually, yes, I can."

"You ignorant…"

" Listen. Leon was my friend. My best friend. Heck, I saved a seat for him every football game that came along. Now he's…" Kevin bit his lip, not finishing the sentence. Claire just stared at him, while Kevin began to look away, both trying to find a way to beachhead into each other's minds.

"…He was like a brother to me, Claire. And now this happens. Neither Chris nor Leon deserved it what happened, but it happened. You're not the only one who's hurting right now. The only chance we get of cracking this case is by getting through your thick skull and finding out how this all started." He then declared, his voice stern, but barely above the faint whisper. A lot of people were already curious as to what they were discussing.

"…You were holding something back from detective Brea in the interrogation room. I want to know what." He softly demanded, not budging from the doorway.

"…" Claire took a deep breath.

"…" Kevin shifted his weight.

"…Well…do you really think you're ready?"

Chapter 1, end.


	2. Antagonist

Author's note: The second chapter. Wasn't that fast? Obviously, my term break isn't as exciting as it should be thanks to a big storm.

Jano: I wanted to see these two guys duke it out a long time. I still don't know why though. Thanks for the rev by the way.

Clinton: Thanks. I intentionally made it a little confusing, and a little bloody, so that the people who blindly click at anything remotely resembling a pairing would get turned off real quick. No offense to them of course, I just don't want anyone reviewing that Leon and Claire should get married in the near future.

SniperR: Claire's a little older now. Besides, a lot of girls get pregnant in their late teens. As for who died, well, read on.

Hotaru: You know me. Besides, I can't kill anyone I want, so murdering people on paper sounds like a good alternative to vent.

****

****

**Chapter 2: "Antagonist" **

The stars shone in delight, laughing, murmuring, holding themselves sentinels of higher stature that did not stoop down into petty vindications and murderous rage as lowly humans did. That, at least, was what the commissioner thought of them as he looked up into the night sky. "…"

The wind howled mercilessly, like the prophet of disaster signaling for his arrival. In their case, it already came to pass. He could still remember the body bag getting zipped to a close, and getting carted out the large lawn where he was now, as if the phantoms of the people involved replayed the scene over and over. Three people, one dead body, and one story that was yet to unfold. _"This is going to be a long week."_ He thought to himself, as his eyes met with the C.S.I. working on the case, who just emerged from inside the house. They were both in their winter years, and they both knew enough to depend on each other through the toughest of times. "Anything new?" the commissioner asked, though he himself was still unsure if he still wanted to know. "Nothing from what we've already established before hand." The C.S.I. responded, taking off his cap for a moment to brush back his black hair, then putting it on again.

"Passion?"

"Chris was very…protective of Claire. That's the only lead we have on what could have caused the fight."

"…" The commissioner's eyes trailed the compound, with everything looking so peaceful that no one would have known that someone was dead and another was dying. "Any word from the security?" he then asked, referring to the solitary man who was in charge of letting people through gates, who they found earlier on, knocked unconscious in his panel.

"Nothing much. He woke up a while ago, told us that he saw Leon get out of his car in front of the gate. Now the security guard, of course, knows who Leon is, I mean, who doesn't around here? Next thing he knows, he dials the house number to make sure that Leon had an appointment, then bam! He gets hit on the back of the neck." The C.S.I. explained.

"Then he opens the gate himself, while Chris is busy in his study, not knowing that Leon was coming for him because everything was dead silent." The commissioner shook his head and looked down to the path that curved downward, to where the gate was left open. "Chris had a number of surveillance cameras in here right?" he asked as he began to walk to the house.

"Yes." Responded the C.S.I. as they both began to walk to the interior.

"So we have something that could show us what happened in his study?"

"…No. For some reason, the most recent tape for the camera in his study is missing. So when it all went down, all they had were an empty player and a camera looking, but not recording."

"Can't we dig up anything from that?"

"If we could, then we'd have this case closed already."

"…We can't pull a blanket over the media's eyes for too long. They know something big went down…"

"…And when word comes out that he's dead, some pretty big people are going to be breathing down our necks." The C.S.I. rubbed his temples in fatigue. "Why did it have to be someone famous?" he groaned to himself. "By the way…where's the girl?"

Claire watched the green light turn yellow, then red, all without their car moving farther than six inches. "What the fuck is causing this motherfucking traffic!?" Kevin shouted inside the car, slamming the horn repeatedly. "Yeah, like blowing the horn is going to make all the other cars disappear." Claire coldly remarked, taking out a cigarette from her purse. She already grabbed her lighter when Kevin noticed what she was doing. "Put that thing down." He ordered, glaring at the girl. "…Fucking boy scout." Then complained the girl, putting back the poison in her purse. "You know, at first glance, you'd look like a guy that a girl could really enjoy. Mustang and all." She then taunted, finishing the sentence like a tease more than anything else.

"First glance, huh?" Kevin responded, not entirely in the mood for a verbal spar with the girl.

"Yeah. Then you'd realize how much a muscle car is needed by guys who overcomp-"

"Wanna see my dick?"

"What?" Claire asked, somewhat startled.

"Trust me, my tool is big enough as it is." Kevin kept his eyes on the road, hoping that eye contact would prevent the girl from noticing his touch man act.

"Wow, you really know how to romance a girl."

"…You really need to get to your apartment before you start telling me what you know?"

"You don't want me talking to the media right?"

"…Yeah, yeah. Whatever." Kevin leaned his elbow on the door hands, and rested his head on his fist. It was beginning to rain. Small drops of water that at the very least understood it's reason for being. Most people are not so lucky.

"At least it's you they stuck me with, not that Aya girl." Claire then remarked, breaking Kevin's coveted moment of silence. "…She's a great officer." He responded, his lack of enthusiasm for a conversation was clear in his voice.

"She's jealous of me. I can tell."

"How the hell do you figure that?"

"I can sense it. The way she looked at me." She said smugly, her eyes trailing to the dashboard compartment. "…You have some serious mood swings." Kevin commented, shaking his head.

"Excuse me?" Claire's eyes were still on the compartment, and Kevin didn't notice.

"With Aya, back in the interrogation room, you looked like you were about to have a nervous breakdown. Now with me, you're acting like a complete…"

"Bitch?" She asked, something devious was in her voice, as her eyes then began to search Kevin's body.

"What are you hiding?" he asked again, this time, a lot more serious. The loud ringing of his mobile phone broke off their staring match, and with a soft curse, he grabbed it from his jean pocket. He hated getting calls in the car, since he usually had to wrestle his phone out off his pants between the traffic and the incessant ringing. "Want me to help you with that?" Claire asked, to which Kevin simply ignored her.

"…" Claire then forcefully placed her hand over his inner thigh, obviously catching him off guard. She found the look of surprise in his face a little exciting, and she began to massage the spot. "Let me ask you again…" she purred seductively. "…Do you need help with that?" Their eyes bore into each other, as if Claire wanted to bring out some animalistic drive from the young man beside her. A very loud horn from the Ford behind them suddenly snapped Kevin back to reality, and he immediately pushed Claire's hand off. "Fag." She sighed to herself, with a grin that could easily piss any man off. _"Don't fucking lose it." _He thought to himself as he slowly pushed the gas, and they were back to slowly inching the car forward in dead silence. _"The way he carries himself…he's beginning to remind me of Leon." _Claire thought as she bit her lower lip.

She watched him fumble again for his mobile phone, this time, with a successful result. With his eyes switching between the mobile and the road, he then connected to the missed call. "…Yeah, Aya. Sorry about that, driving." Were the first words that came to the receiver. "…Stuck in traffic. No, nothing from her. Don't worry, I can handle this." He continued to talk, making Claire a bit irritated that the attention did not fall squarely on her, as she thought it rightfully should. 'Yeah, yeah, I'll kick your ass, I promise." Kevin joked, with the short moment to talk to his friend an open sigh of relief. At least Claire also found the time for herself, with the six inches between Kevin and her now seemingly light years apart. "…"

Aya turned off her mobile phone, her smile disappearing soon after the silence began to kick in. Turning off the engine of her red Mazda, she stepped out into the cold, warm cup of coffee in hand. The commissioner instantly greeted her with a gesture to come closer, as he could be seen from the lobby, through the open double door of the massive house. "How is he?" was the commissioner's immediate question, just as she was in audible reach. "Still off the far end." She responded, entering the house.

"And Claire? Did she talk to Kevin yet?"

"No. Or at least, he wasn't letting me on to something."

"Damn. When Jill comes back, we'll never hear the end of it."

"Lucky us if she doesn't mow down our entire police force."

"…" The commissioner fell silent, looking as if he was in deep contemplation, but actually just imagining Jill Valentine in her mini.

"…So, did the brainiacs over here conceptualize how exactly he died?"

"Bullets."

"I mean how."

"How about you ask them?"

"…Fine." Taking another sip from her coffee, she buttoned her dark gray coat to a close, still feeling the cold through seep into the lifeless house. The commissioner watched her disappear into the study, unimpressed with the opulence surrounding her. "If I get to save the world, I want a house this big." He mumbled to himself, before following the young detective into the study.

"Where the hell are we?" Claire complained, as they began to wander the empty streets. Dilapidated apartments covered them in shadow, with the only landmark being the massive steel bridge that was overhead. "At least there's no traffic." Kevin muttered, not letting his agitation get the best of him.

"I swear, if you're a serial killer, I am going to kick your ass."

"If I were a serial killer, I wouldn't stand up with being next to you for two hours and just shoot you!" he snapped back, finally letting go of his cool.

"Believe me, I'd rather be dead than be seen with you." She sneered back.

"Oh what, is acting like a high school cheerleader part of your mood swings?"

"You know what?"

"What?" He asked, absolutely out of patience.

"You're cute when you get all mad like this." She teased, raising her eyebrow seductively.

"…" He watched in silence as her hand once again began to trail his thigh.

"We are in the middle of the fucking road." He protested, although this time, a lot less forceful than before.

"No one's watching. Hell, no one else is driving."

"…You know how many kids I had to scrub off the streets in my rookie year because they weren't paying attention to the road?"

"Then pull over for a while." She cooed into his ear. She could smell the sweat that was beginning to form around his face. "…" Kevin tried to ignore, her, keep on driving, try to see if some crazy kid would run across the street in the darkness that surrounded the neighborhood. _"Boy scout!" _Claire yelled to herself, as she then grabbed his crotch, quickly, and with a hard grip. "Shit!" Kevin cried as he made a quick turn to the left to park the car. "What the hell are you-" But before he could finish, Claire kissed him forcefully, without feeling, only animalistic urge. Her grip on his crotch grew harder, and so did the manhood that was quickly beginning to strain against the denim. It was only when he began to kiss back that Claire retracted her lips, and in a short second of puzzlement on behalf of Kevin, she finally strikes. With a loud cry, she struck him at the neck with her elbow, causing him to choke in pain.

Kevin's eyes blurred as he grasped his throbbing neck, leaning on the steering wheel for support. _"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" _he thought, as he heard the dashboard compartment open. He knew what was inside, and from the looks of it, Claire did too. He turned, tried to stop her, but he was met with a barrel of the gun pointing straight at his eye. "Back off." Claire hissed, giving Kevin a glimpse of the woman who survived an onslaught of bloodthirsty zombies practically alone, something that he only accomplished through the help and sacrifice of seven others. "…You don't want to do this Claire. I know you're upset, and maybe you're a little scared…but that's no reason to do what you're planning on doing." He whispered, trying to bring a sense of reason to the girl. With her left hand, Claire reached behind her, fumbling for the lock, then opening the door, all the while, her right hand steadily kept the pistol at headshot.

"Claire…!"

"Goodnight, officer Ryman."

Chapter 2, end.


	3. Return

Author's note: And here's chapter 3. Enjoy. Or you know, whatever. And for the lost, italicized paragraphs stand for recollections. It's up to you to figure out who is recollecting, which is like, something a gradeschooler could do.

Jano: Thanks man, well, not too crazy this chapter, but all hell is going to break loose soon enough.

Hotaru: I actually want to be an actor more than a director, but hey, not everything goes my way.

Samurai: Yeah, Wesker can seriously kick Chris' ass all over the place. But Leon against Chris, odds are, the bigger, more experienced guy jacked up on military training's gonna win.

SniperR: I might just go ahead and tease you by revealing who died at the end of the story. Or not. Yeah, Claire's got some mad skillz.

****

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**Chapter 3: "Return" **

__

_Leon watched the sun rise through the large, glass doors that led to the balcony of his condominium. Sitting at the edge of his bed, naked, much like his lover who was still fast asleep, Leon could not help but smile at the new day. For him, it was almost symbolic of the new life that they'd lead. He then slowly turned his head, gazing at the figure of the girl, on arm over her head, while the other holding a blanket nigh teasingly over her breasts. "…" With a soft sigh, Leon titled his body halfway, leaned down, and kissed Claire on her forehead. With that, he got up and headed for the shower, not noticing Claire's eyes slit open, as if trying not to be seen awake. She watched him walk into another room, and as he disappeared, a small, broken smile etched itself on her lips. _

Claire wiped a tear from her eye as she drove through the street like a bat out of hell, occasionally glancing at the rear view mirror to see if anyone found the body she left behind. The pistol was sitting comfortably on the passenger seat, urging her to do more violence. There was a small splatter of blood that was determined to ruin the leather. "…" Her eyes glanced at the rearview mirror again, but this time, noticing the small, plastic rosary that was dangling on it. A good number of Catholics had some sort of religious icon in their vehicles as a sign of faith, but more commonly, as a pendant for safety. Something about the two intersecting lines began to hypnotize Claire, as if just by locking into it with her eyes, she could already touch something deeper, something much more than anyone could understand.

__

_"I never knew you were…" Claire stared at the crucifix that hung on the wall, right above the wide plasma TV. "Yeah, well. Having that up there makes my conscience attack me whenever I have an inkling to watch porn." Leon joked, putting the finishing touches on their breakfast. She was still in bed, while he was_ _clad in a white towel, having just finished showering. "By the way, I haven't stopped by to your place…say hello to Chris." Leon then mentioned, putting the plates on a tray, ready to serve them to Claire. "…Why do you need to do that?" she asked, her face suddenly changing, albeit subtly. "Well, he did save my life once…" Leon responded, setting down the tray on the bed. "Something wrong?" he asked, not needing to be the most empathic to sense Claire's dread. _

With gritted teeth, Claire reached up and violently removed the rosary from the rearview mirror, throwing it to the backseat not a second after. _"…" _Her eyes once again fell on the pistol, her gaze shifting between the road and the sleek black plastic. Whereas religion gave her a sense of hope, the pistol gave her a choice of action. And it was in the passing light of fading lamps, dancing over the pistol like taunting devils that she found an answer to a question that she herself did not yet ask. Still, something unearthly, something not right, dawned on her, and for some reason, she knew that the only answer she could ever hope to have, was through the barrel of a gun.

"No word from Kevin." Aya reported, not afraid to show her concern to the commissioner. It was midnight, and they were back at the precinct, not even thinking about giving themselves the pleasure of rest until the case was over. "…Damn." The commissioner on the other hand, was not intent on losing his cool. "…What are the chances that he just decided to turn off his mobile?" he then asked, rubbing his temple, while his free hand trailed a golden letter opener on his table.

"He doesn't turn it off while having sex, commissioner." Aya responded, crossing her hands in front of her chest. "Oh. I disturbed you two that much?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"…Let's not…just…something went wrong. I feel it."

"And your emotions are not clouding your better judgement?"

"I do not trust her. Not with him. Not with anyone." Her response was quick, almost rehearsed. The commissioner did not spend any time to bring out such an observation to the discussion.

"I specifically asked Kevin to gain her trust. And if turning off his mobile phone is the way to do it, then let it be." He then argued, leaning back on his leather chair. "Like it or not, detective, this isn't about any of us. This is about Claire Redfield, and the answers that she's keeping from us." He then finished, an air of gravity reflective on his voice.

"…Sir."

"…" The commissioner let out a loud sigh, and then leaned forward, resting his elbows on his desk. "Dispatch two cars, no sirens, have them watch Claire's condo and Kevin's home."

"Yes sir. Thank you, sir." Aya responded, lighting up as she left to give the order.

"…And Aya!" he called, prompting the young detective to peek back into the office.

"…Don't let them know anything. Tell them that it's strictly a routine check on the safety of the residents." He then ordered, his voice low and stern. "…How long do we plan on keeping this a secret?" Aya asked.

"Enough people." He responded grimly, making Aya realize that he was a man who would do anything to control a situation if it ever got out of hand, and she did not want to take the fall if it meant facing such a man. "…" Aya closed the door to the commissioner's office behind her, and headed straight for a water fountain. Only a few people were left, insomniacs who didn't want to face their families, had none, or were like her, terrified of bumbling in front of the commissioner. "…" Aya let the cold water splash on her dry lips, closing her eyes, relishing the feeling. It was a nice break from all the caffeine that she had swimming in her system. For some reason, she still felt as if the red turtleneck that she wore made her stick out like a sore thumb, even though she's already had it on for roughly more than half the day.

__

_Kevin laughed out loud, choking on a pretzel as he did, not that he cared. It was Christmas, three months after they first met, and it was more than the scarves, jackets, and coats that made them feel warm. Snow fell lightly on the window, almost invisible thanks to the sun that oddly shone even through the undead cold. "Stop laughing! Mutant horses are not funny!" Aya yelled at him, albeit jokingly, she too was under the effect of that warm feeling that so many people cherish. "Yeah, but come on, all you had to do was move out of the way and they'd end up hitting a wall or something." he joked back, taking a drink from his Frap. "…" Aya smiled, feeling glad that she found someone who was more or less like herself, a survivor. "By the way, you have a thing with your cornea right? Do you like, see dead people?" he asked, Aya not entirely sure if it was a serious question or not. Her flabbergasted expression just made Kevin laugh louder, making Aya revel in the joy that she then felt soon after. _

Aya took a big gulp, and stood back up, wiping her lips with the back of her palm. She signaled for a passing officer, a rookie, to come by her, it was a call that the young man did not hesitate to comply with. "Yes ma'am?" he asked, the late hours not a hindrance to the pure, almost innocence, that radiated from his blue eyes. "You're paired with Bendis, right?" she asked him, to which he responded positively. "Okay, I have a job for you. I need you to drive around Radissons street, see if anything goes awry."

"…Yes ma'am, but aren't those all condominiums there?"

"Yeah. Hey, if you're lucky, you could spot Claire Redfield. I heard she stayed in one of them."

"Really? The Claire Redfield? The girl who survived-"

"Yes, yes, her." Aya quickly chided, not in the mood for another fanboy who got into the academy just so they could hear more war stories. She already thought that Claire had enough credentials to star in a wrestling program. It didn't prevent her from wearing a faux smile as she issued the order though. "And tell Millar to do the same, only tell him to keep watch over at San Antonio Street." She then ordered, heading for her table. _"Get a grip, girl. Kevin can handle himself. He's a survivor."_ Aya reassured herself. _"Wait, wait wait, what the fuck? Why should I be concerned about him? He's just a selfish asshole!" _She rubbed her temples, getting aggravated at the sudden thought. _"…I'm just doing my job." _

__

_"You owe me big time." Kevin snarled at her, albeit jokingly, as she stretched outside of the interrogation room. "…Yeah well, you always said you were good with the ladies." Aya responded, raising an eyebrow. She was always one to stand up to a fight, whether it be verbal, or perhaps even with a flame throwing madwoman who mutates over time. "This is about me going out with Melissa, isn't it?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning on the concrete wall. "Oh please…" Aya replied, rolling her eyes. "I couldn't care less about you fucking some celebrity that you hooked up with." She then said, clearly lying through her teeth. "…For your information, I was really, really excited to connect with Melissa tonight. Connect. It's a concept that you seem to have trouble grasping." He shot back, not minding the discomfort that this was causing Aya. He himself, behind the façade of the strongman, was also the victim of a heart beating faster than a percussion instrument in a Woodstock. "Oh? So what kind of connecting do you have planned? Your dick up her cunt? Wow, way to move forward in a relationship. Oh wait, you never lasted more than two months with a girl…I wonder why?" she snapped back, placing her hands on her waist. "Listen, I really want to make things work between me and Melissa, okay? The last thing I need, is a jealous--"_

"Detective!" someone called, holding a phone that hung on the wall.

"Yeah?" she pushed back her hair, acting as if nothing was stirring in her head.

"…it's about officer Ryman."

The commissioner put on his long, brown coat, glancing through the blinds of his office to watch Aya rush into the elevator, clearly in distress. His brow curled up, with the cold grasp of dread slowly creeping into his blood. He knew that Aya was a fine officer, one that kept a cool head in the heat of battle, and the only thing that could ever work her up was Kevin Ryman. He did not bother to ask about Kevin's condition, since it was not the primary importance. A man who can take care of a mutant alligator can obviously take care of himself._"…No time for worry." _He thought, tidying his blue tie, and then adjusting the buckle on his belt. _"We all…still have a job to do." _He then thought, as if he wanted Aya to heat hose words as well. _"And we always have to keep in mind that the safety of others, is paramount." _His eyes fell on a picture of his late wife. _"No matter how much our heart tells us to stop." _

"Sir? You're leaving?" asked a young woman who carried a good number of folders.

"Yes, Emily, I have a very important matter to attend to." He responded, closing the door behind him.

"But sir, we just got the report on the vigilante dressed as a bat…"

"Leave it on my table, Jessica."

"Yes sir." She replied, keeping inside her irritation about not being at the very least recognized for her work. She fumbled to get the door open; all the while the commissioner just walked away, his head in the clouds. Besides, even a gesture of chivalrous intent to women, for him, might be a form of dishonor to the sacred memory of his dead wife. But then again, no thoughts of self, or other, filled his mind as he walked down the ghostly halls of the police department. The soft buzz of a floor buffer echoed down the corridor, and the commissioner wished for a moment that the sound could drown out all the fear that he had in his heart. But that was only for a moment. He was a man who did not dare to hope, for the sole reason that he sees the world as a place that does not opt for hope.

"Oh, sir!" Jessica called, jogging after the commissioner just as he got to the main lobby.

"Yes?" he asked, his mind still somewhere else.

"I was wondering, if it would be okay if I…"

"Yes?"

"…Well, it's just that my, uh, there's this Jazz thing, going on at The Temple, and I was wondering if maybe, you and I could go." She kept her hands behind her, almost as if showing off her vulnerability to the seasoned man before her. It definitely caught him off guard.

"…Pardon me?"

"…Uh, I…"

"Jessica, I'm twice your age."

"Oh, yes, well, yeah…I know, but…"

"…I have someplace to go. Thank you for the good job with the paperwork." He said, albeit awkwardly, before turning once again to leave. The massive statue of a woman in a blindfold, right in the middle of the lobby, loomed over him, like an avatar of his past, condemning him for even having the pleasure of a thought. _"…" _The commissioner shook his head to himself, a gesture that Jessica, still watching, took a little too personally. _"Back to reality." _Thought the commissioner, buttoning his coat as he descended the stone steps. As soon as the cold winds brushed his face, the alarming words of the private nurse rang back to his ears, the very reason that he was hurrying out of his office just minutes ago. _"Mr. Commissioner." _He easily remembered her raspy voice. _"Chris Redfield just woke up." _

Chapter 3, End.


	4. Tear

Author's note: Second day of classes, I'm going to get this story through hopefully before my midterms, so I can focus on bringing up my GPA. Wish me luck! Anyway, this is a pretty linear chapter, so enjoy.

Hotaru: Yeah, he's alive. But will he be for long?

Clinton: I blame my chapter breaking on reading Whedon's X-Men run. Everytime the last panel ends, I'm going "Fuck!?" Thanks for the compli though.

SniperR: Well, at least one of those questions is going to get an answer.

Tek: Hey, I missed you. Don't worry, I'm pretty inspired by a special someone right now, so much so that I may actually consider writing a romantic comedy on my next run. How weird is that!?

**Chapter 4: "Tear" **

"It was your name listed under the emergency contacts. We thought about calling the police, but, well, you are the police." The nurse detailed as he walked with Aya down a brightly lit corridor. Unlike Aya, the countless winters did not bode her well. She was short, almost half of Aya's height, which itself was not something she'd brag about. Her red hair was tied up to a bun, and her body was quite large, thanks primarily to eating over the night rotation. But still, there was an undeniable life in her clear, green eyes. So clear that it somehow managed to contradict every other glaringly unattractive feature that she may hold.

"How long since you…how long since you found him? " Aya's voice broke at the question, something uncharacteristic of the strong young woman.

"A few hours ago. We couldn't call anyone until it was over."

"…Is there anyone else? Seeing him? Now? Or…"

"Nobody. You're the first person here. The only one under his emergency contacts list."

"…Oh." Aya bowed her head, remembering how Kevin nearly cried when she wouldn't stop harassing him about his family.

__

_Kevin threw a mug across the room, with a loud crash that was sure to upset the people in the other apartments. He gritted his teeth, and faced Aya. "They're dead. I…I was too busy being a cop. Back in Raccoon City, during the Outbreak. I was…drinking. I…when it happened, the Outbreak I mean, all…all I could think about was doing my job. And I completely forgot…or I wanted to forget, to not think, about what was happening to the people I loved when I was running for my life." Kevin stopped, and looked to the floor, shaking his head. " No…no, I'm lying to myself. My God. I wasn't…I wasn't too busy being a cop. I was too busy running. I was too busy being afraid! And I forgot! I forgot about being a brother! About being a son! I forgot…! I…just…is this what you wanted to know? You're grand reason for breaking up with me? Because I don't share my life with you? Because I don't talk as much as you want me to? Well here it is! I'm a fucking coward. I'm a fucking coward and because of me, my mom and dad, my baby brother…all of them! I wasn't there for any of them because I was too busy drinking instead of going to my own father's birthday!" _

Aren't you awfully young to be a police officer?" the nurse asked, trying to alleviate the worry that she could see in the detective's cloudy eyes. It managed to snap Aya back to the present. "…I…moisturize. A lot." Aya responded, her eyes scanning the name of the nurse on the I.D. that dangled down her neck. "Uh… Ms. Madison?"

"…? Yes, dear?"

"…Nothing. Sorry, nothing."

"…We're almost there. By the way, there's a snack dispenser by the end of the hall, just a couple of rooms away from where he is." She pointed to the far end, past a couple of other nurses putting their red jackets on, ready to sign off of their rotation. A good number of them were still young; mostly students who wanted to take nursing to cash into the demand for health care professionals. Two or three were from Asia.

"…Thanks." Aya replied, her voice a reflection of how tired she was inside and out. The nurse smiled at her, a smile that seemed to hint as if she was in this bigger scheme of things that is beyond the comprehension of normal man. They had stopped, in front of room 302. "…" Aya smiled back at her, before her hand slowly reached for the steel doorknob. She heard the nurse begin to walk away, and she did not turn to see her farewell. She knew that they both had jobs to do. The cold steel felt foreign in her hands, even though she's held hospital doorknobs before, for her, each time felt different. Each time had with it a different sense of dread, of anxiety, of joy or of grief. _"Maybe, I should get him something first." _She thought, her head turning to the far end of the hall. A kid, barely five or six, was complaining about being bored. Not noticing the fear that was etched like an epitaph on the face of his mother, whom neither of them knew, just realized that her husband only had a few months to live. _"…" _

__

_Aya hurried out of the apartment, quickly wiping a tear away from her eye. It was her choice after all, to end it between them. She buttoned her orange jacket up to her neck, and shot her hands into her pockets. "This was a mistake." She thought to herself, thinking about how incredibly shallow her reason for breaking up with him was. Her fingers played with the keys in her pocket, as her feet hit the pavement of the sidewalk, once again joining the faces of a hundred other people. "He…this isn't…this isn't my fault." She constantly reassured herself in her mind, flashing to some fantastic setting of a perfect relationship, one that she's always dreamed of, one that Kevin failed to deliver. _

__

_"I wanted everything to be perfect." _Aya thought to herself, blaming herself, with her body beginning to tremble for the shame that was beginning to overwhelm her. Her hand was still clenched tightly on the doorknob, as if it itself was afraid of either pushing forward or letting go. _"Kevin…I'm so sorry." _Taking a deep breath, Aya turned the knob, and pushed the door open. A television hanging on the wall, tuned on a football game, was the first thing that she saw, followed by the foot of the bed, and the white sheets that covered the patient.

"Kevin?" she asked, the look of concern in concealable.

"…You look horrible." Came a weak response. Kevin smiled, the best he could, as a slew of bandages covered his upper torso, while a good number of machines was hooked up to his system as well. __

"What can I say? Coffee's horrible." Aya joked back, an old joke that they shared when they worked on graveyard shifts as partners. Her smile kept back the tears from pouring down her face like a waterfall, but it could not help let a few streams sneak through.

"No sad eyes." Kevin whispered, as Aya got a chair and sat by his side. She could barely hear his voice even as it was. "…What?" there was a slight chuckle in her voice, it was her mind trying to rationalize her fears by balancing them with, at the very least, happy memories.

"We made a promise right? No sad eyes for each other when…"

"Don't say that. You'll be fine." Aya responded, as her mind raced back to almost every moment that they had, as if someone was playing a bittersweet cacophony of images all in her mind.

"…I'm sorry I let her get away."

"…"

"She does give one hell of a performance though."

"I'll get her for this. I swear."

"She's dang-"

"No, don't, don't worry. Don't think about her. We'll handle. You just…get well. Okay?" her hands found his, a mixture of cold and warmth, of life and fading existence. Kevin's tendered at hers.

__

_"Good night, officer Ryman." Claire hissed. Kevin immediately lashed back, grabbing Claire's hand and turning the gun away before she could open a hole through his head. She yelled out loud, frantically wrestling the gun, at the same time careful, however possible that was, not to let a shot ring out and alert anyone nearby of what was happening. Not, at least, until it was too late. "Let…go!" Kevin cried, forcefully punching Claire square on the jaw. It was enough to break off her hold and make her stumble to the side. Kevin aimed the gun at her. "You have the right, to remain-"Kevin stopped, and watched in shock as Claire began to swell with tears, her back against the passenger door, such that she was completely facing him in that small space. "Please…don't hurt me." She begged in between sobs. "You…e-everything you say will…" Kevin continued, his voice breaking between gasps of air. It was obvious that his mind shifted to Claire's hand, which was trailing her inner thigh. "What are you-?" Kevin asked, as Claire began to raise her skirt, revealing her underwear. "Please, I was just…so scared…" she continued, her hand gingerly hovering over the opening between her legs. Her other hand was over her breast, pushing down the dress a little, just to show Kevin that she wasn't wearing a bra. "I'll do anything you want…" she whispered, still crying, still sweating._

"I'm so sorry. If it weren't for…this is my fault…" Aya told him, somehow always managing to put the flow of the conversation on her being, thought often inadvertent. Kevin knew the truth of those words, but it was not in his nature to blame. It never was. "Don't worry about it." He responded, not telling her how tiring it was for him to even speak. "…"

"I know…you could make it up to me." He then said. "When I get out of here, I want a big dinner." He grinned at her, though every muscle on his jaw ached as he did. He had to be strong, he had to be brave, at the very least, he had to show her that he still sees her as someone that he truly cares for. For her. All for her. Though more often than not, these are the things that she wouldn't notice. Aya let out a soft laugh, nodding her head as confirmation. "You have a dorky grin." She whispered.

"Dorky? Who says dorky anymore?"

"Oh…all the cool kids."

"Heh. Mandy Moore said dorky in The Princess Diaries."

"See? You're dorky. I bet deep down, you'd never know how to act when a girl's more aggressive than you."

__

_"Please…I…I don't want to hurt again…not like with…" Claire pleaded, her fingers trembling at the entrance of her vagina. "Stop it...!" Kevin ordered, his hand, and his aim, trembling as much as Claire. "Chris understands! He does! Not like Leon!" she cried, gripping herself tighter, even more sexual, directly appealing to the animal in any man. "What the hell are you talking about!?" Kevin yelled ,but it didn't seem to distract the woman from her distraught. "…He…hurt me…because…because…" Claire's tears were now uncontrollable, and her vice broke after almost every syllable. "…Claire?" It was idiotic, but for a split second, Kevin let his guard down. His tense muscles softened, as the curiosity mixed with sudden pity began to stab at him inside. It was a just a mere second, which enough for Claire to capitalize on the situation. She easily swatted Kevin's hand away with her back of her palm, and no sooner than Kevin's mind could register what was happening, Claire already stuck a small knife into his arm. Kevin let out a cry of pain as the sudden jolt made him drop the gun by Claire's feet. She saw the opening, and she immediately grabbed the gun. Instinct. Kevin grabbed her by the collar and pushed her back to the seat, in hopes that she wouldn't get the gun, but it was an admirable effort left in vain. As she got pulled back, she immediately opened fire on him, point blank. One bullet tore through his collarbone, another through his chest, and one more to his stomach. He let out a gasp of pain, as the shock to his system prevented him from screaming his head off. He slumped back to the door, his eyes dazed, and his breath getting slower and slower. Claire raised her eyebrow, and shot him again through the stomach, putting him out of consciousness. _

"Kevin?" Aya leaned closer to him.

"…Yeah? I've got bad breath, I know." He softly joked, each one a concealment of his true feelings, whatever they may have been at the moment, and whomever they may be directed. Aya smiled, her eyebrows furrowed at the same time. Tender eyes. "About…when…back when…" Aya struggled to find the words. "…I'm so sorry for…" her eyes began to tear up, and she humbled herself to the fact that she was not as strong as she thought she was. That she was not as strong as she wanted to be.

"Hey, hey…don't." Kevin held her hand tighter, somewhat wishing that the strength he still had in his frail hand was enough to support the woman who was near her breaking point. She tried her best not to cry, and it showed, it showed in her cheeks that were now red, and her lips that trembled uncontrollably. "…Please…don't…" He himself getting pushed to shed a few tears.

"…Maybe I should fix myself up…" Aya said, trembling. Kevin smiled as a response, it was always his way of saying yes. "…My bathroom's really fucked up by the way. Maybe you should use the one down the hall…" he then told her.

"Okay…I'll be back soon. I promise." Her eyes locked into his, and his to hers, and in a second, she bent closer to kiss him softly on the lips. "…Wow, maybe I should get shot more often." Kevin said, still in a voice that was barely above a whisper. "I'm just glad that you're alright." Aya reminded him, standing up, and after a moment, turning to the door.

"…Aya…?"

"…Yeah?"

"…It's not your fault. Remember that…okay?"

"…Okay." Aya turned the knob and left. The mother and son were already gone, off to their own personal tragedy no doubt. Aya took a deep breath, and leaned on the wall, covering her face with her hands, so that, at the very least, no one would hear her cry. A cold wind then went through her, and all of a sudden, a loud, sharp, beeping sound then emanated for Kevin's room. "What… what?" Aya looked around, finding about three nurses quickly rushing to the area. "What's happening!?"

Chapter 4, End.


	5. Eyes

Author's note: Hmm? I'm still alive? That's odd. Sorry it took me eons to update, I was busy.

Hotaru: Yes, Claire is such a whore.

SniperR: Well, sometimes people just can't hold back.

TommyK: Sure.

Evil: Won't argue there. I'm no fan of Chris, I just needed Leon to die. But on a side note, Chris had military training, whereas Leon did get training from the government. Unfortunately, also from personal experience, no matter how good a striker or grappler you are, you have to be into a certain mindset when you enter a confrontation. If you weren't, then you wouldn't know that a grappler can easily beat a striker and a striker could easily beat a grappler. That's all I'll say since it will ruin some points in the later part of the story.

Recap: Leon and Chris fight, leaving the former dead and the latter gravely wounded. Claire, after an interrogation, and an escort back to her apartment, snaps and fatally wounds officer Kevin Ryman, and then disappears. Detective Aya Brea, a close personal friend of Officer Ryman, is then called by the hospital to tell him of what happened to the lawman. At the same time, the police commissioner gets a call from a secret hospital that Chris Redfield has finally woken up, and may finally get to explain what just happened…

**Chapter 5: "Eyes"**

Her lips felt dry, gasping, longing for something to help soothe the swirling emotions within her. Aya stared at the motionless body blanketed in white, getting carted away by a young male nurse. The sound of the wheels seemed to grind into her mind, like nails tearing through some rough surface. She let out a silent gasp of air as her eyes followed them down a corridor, getting reminded of how the body underneath, just moments ago, had friends, loves, family. Aya then turned to the opposite end of the corridor, to find a middle-aged woman, her heart over her chest, watching the body disappear into a corner. Her eyes were red, like she was desperately trying to hold back breaking. "…" Aya's eyes connected to the woman's, silent, unbearable. A door by the woman was half open, and even in some distance, Aya could hear the soft whimpering of the people inside. "…"

"…Sometimes…these things just happen." Nurse Madison said as she approached Aya from behind, breaking off her gaze with the woman in the hall. "…" Aya, still silent, turned to see the small woman, her face a sad smile. She reminded Aya of her mother, always comforting. "…What exactly happened? Wasn't he already stable" asked Aya, her voice a hoarse whisper. "It was an embolism." Responded the nurse.

"…a what?"

"Sometimes…sometimes, when wounds leave punctures deep inside the body, even if we do manage to saw it up together again, there may be small…openings. Sometimes, when the puncture is in the lung, air could still escape from the opening…and enter the blood stream."

"…" Aya nodded, signaling for the nurse to continue.

"…Air, fills you up. And you suffocate from it."

"…"

"I'm sorry you had to go through that."

"…"

"…You know, sometimes, it's better to not be brave." Madison placed a hand on Aya's shoulder and smiled, before resuming her rotation. "…" Aya took a deep breath and looked at the end of the corridor. The woman was gone.

"It's good to see you again, Chris." Whispered the commissioner, his hands deep in the pockets of his trench coat. "I'm sorry we couldn't give you better accommodations." He then added, looking around at the Spartan hospital room that looked more like a prison cell, with dim lights, and only the barest of necessities.

"…I never thought I'd actually have to use one of these." Chris responded weakly. His eyes were still closed, his jaw barely moved as he spoke. What was left of his booming voice was now just a raspy murmur. The white bed sheet covered him to his collar, making the commissioner wonder what scars were glaring underneath. "The public isn't ready to know that one of the undersecretaries of defense nearly got killed, especially now that Mr. President seems to transfixed on waging war with everybody." Responded the commissioner.

"…How are you doing?"

"Fine. Fine, thank you."

"It's been a long time." Chris forced a smile.

"Yeah. Since Umbrella."

"Looks like I owe you another one."

"…Who's keeping count?"

"…" Chris managed to let out a small smile.

"Can you tell me what happened?"

_With loud cries, both men jumped for the gun. "No!" Chris got it first, then immediately fell back to avoid colliding with the other man. He then got up, aiming the gun at the younger man, pulling the trigger as fast as he could. A shot went right through Leon's rib cage, but he resisted the pain, even though it seemed to grow tentacles and stretch forever into every nerve and artery in his system. Leon reached out, and grabbed Chris' neck, trying to isolate the windpipe. The pain however, made it almost impossible for him to concentrate enough on getting the job done, at least before Chris could get a fatal shot through. "Break…break…"Leon thought, bracing the pain, as he let go of Chris neck. A second later, he let out all his strength, and struck Chris on the face with the bottom of his palm. He missed his mark, hitting Chris on the lips instead of the nose. If it did connect, the nasal bridge would have been broken and then get pushed straight to the brain, resulting in what could only be described as a quick death._

"Chris?" the commissioner stepped closer, noticing the bedridden man'snose suddenly twitch.

"…"

"I'm sure that you wouldn't want the president's men coming here and beating the answers out of you. He does owe Mr. Kennedy quite a bit." The commissioner continued, referring to the deceased's suicidal mission to save the president's daughter. "I'm sure it would be much easier if you told me everything, and I'd relay the message for you. Save you the grief."

_"Fuck you!" Chris managed to blurt out through gritted teeth, feeling blood begin to trickle from his mouth. He staggered back from the blow, blindly shooting straight ahead, only to end up hitting the far wall. It was easy enough for Leon to avoid the gunfire, though every step seems to be killing him even more, primarily from the blood loss. Even before he set foot on the compound, even before he got emotional, he already felt something wrong with him. As if he needed to keep his heart under lock and key, because there was something lurking in him and taking away his inhibitions one by one. He may have been drunk. Leon grabbed a silver letter opener from the desk with his right hand, and held it with the point facing downward. At that moment, he was to the right of Chris, and as the older man turned to aim the gun to his side, Leon let out a strong slash with his newfound weapon. It sliced violently across Chris elbow, making him lose his aim, but not the grip on his gun. The temporary setback for Chris gave Leon enough time to plunge the letter opener into his opponent's chest._

"Maybe he lost his mind." Chris suddenly responded, staring at the ceiling.

"You're kidding."

"…He just…came at me. Shouting…"

"…about what?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"He didn't make any sense."

"…" The commissioner took out his hands from his pockets and adjusted his belt buckle.

"I don't even remember much of what happened. It was such a blur…like a hammer across my skull."

_Leon drowned out the painful scream of the older man, just as he attempted to drown out the pain that was slowly lulling him to darkness. "Groggy…groggy…can't…" Chris slugged the younger man straight on the face with his left fist, making sure that his endurance won't give out just because of a stab wound. Leon reeled to his left from the force of the blow, but instead of coming straight back at Chris, he made a full turn, and smacked his left heel on Chris' temple. The force sent him flying across the table, falling awkwardly over his leather chair. The move also made Leon lose balance, falling on his stomach right after his full turn. "Deep breaths…deep breaths…" the young man silently urged his body, as he felt his strength waver. That was when a small glint of hope shone in the corner of Leon's eye. Chris dropped the gun, and it was laid gingerly beside Leon's feet. "…gun…gun…get…gun…" He could hear the older man start to move back from the other side of the table. "Reach…for…Claire…I love you so much." With a loud cry, he grabbed the gun and nearly jumped up, just as Chris was still leaning on the edge of the table. Before the older man could even react, Leon let out a volley of blind shots, sending bullets that tore through Chris' collarbone, shoulder and ear. Only Leon's war cry drowned out the loud drums of gunfire._

"Part of you're ear is missing. Shouldn't something like that at least bring back memories?" the commissioner asked, hesitant to let Chris know exactly how suspicious he was of the entire situation.

"…I remember him shooting. Everywhere. Shooting."

"I'm sure ballistics won't disagree with you there."

_Chris screamed in utter agony, something uncharacteristic, as he fell back, pulling the top drawer down with him. "Finish this!" Leon screamed internally as he let the adrenaline course through his blood. He jumped up the table, ignoring the blinding pain from the hole in his ribcage, and looking to finish the game. "Checkmate!" Chris gritted his teeth as he shot his arm up, pointing a brand new Smith and Wesson revolver at straight at Leon. Time pulled to a stop for Leon as he noticed the gun. It came from a small case that splattered to the floor along with a plethora of papers that was hidden in the drawer that Chris pulled out. With a sadistic grin, Chris opened fire, hitting Leon right through the stomach. Before the pain could even register to Leon's senses, another shot tore through his chest, and then another, and another. Crying out in pain, he blindly opened fire in one sweep of his arm as reprisal, lodging a bullet into Chris' abdomen. "Not enough…!" the older man thought as he resumed fire, now clutching his bleeding torso. The last two shots from Chris' gun came out just seconds after the other, one that went under Leon's arm, while the other hit him right through the neck. _

"So you're trying to say that…it was diminished capacity. Leon."

"…I've known him for so long… I don't know why he would do something like this." Chris responded, his face a medley of confusion and anger. The commissioner could see the strain it took for the younger man to just talk. "What about Claire? Does she know?" Chris asked, his voice now riddled with concern.

"…Yes."

"…my God." Chris closed his eyes, looking like he forced back the flow of tears.

"We're still taking control of the situation. Making sure her grief won't cause us any trouble."

"…Keep an eye over her. You know how she can be."

"Yes. Yes I do."

"…Leon was like a brother to me."

_The younger man's body twisted back in recoil. "…" His eyes opened wide, staring brightly at the ruined chandelier over them, and with one last gasp, he crumpled on top of the table, soaking it in his crimson. "…" Chris dropped the gun and fell back, blocking out the pain that stabbed across him. Between all the smoke of gunfire, the splattered blood and ruined history, Chris could do nothing but smile. He could hear that sound of the front doors opening, and the thud of loud footsteps that seemed to sense if something was wrong. "…Just in time." Chris thought, as he took one deep breath, and surrendered to the darkness. _

"…I guess you need to rest. I'll come back some other time."

"…Take care of her for me. She's the only family I have left." Chris beseeched just as the commissioner was about to turn away. The commissioner tilted his head up for a moment, then bowed his head down, scratching the bridge of his nose with his index finger. "…"

"I was wondering by the way…" the commissioner started, still half-turned, not sure whether to face Chris or the door. "…"

"…Leon was…if indeed, Leon was under the influence of…something…"

"…"

"…and given you're background…shouldn't you have been capable of incapacitating Leon without taking his life?" The commissioner glanced at Chris, who's face stiffened at the sudden implicit accusation. "…I'm sorry for taking up so much of your time." The elder man then said, picking up his hat from a small chair by the door before walking out. "…"

Author's note: Hope you all enjoyed that. Drop me a line and tell me what you think. Till next time.


	6. Surge

Norman Steve: Thanks man, though I'm not sure what genre this is anymore.

Hotaru: Obviously from the noisiest villain in movie history. I just wanted Uma to kill him and be done with it.

Tonya: Thanks. The sequel thing was in my other comp, which unfortunately, I don't know where is right now, I think my dad gave it away or something.

Samurai: Yeah, and apparently, you didn't read my previous comment. Oh, and redundancy in a statement makes it all the less glaring, so next time (if you) you review, do be more constructive.

Evil: Single-mindedly driven aren't you? Here's a touch-up. Chris is contradicting himself. That means he is lying. And according to basic value class, that makes him fundamentally bad. That makes him fodder for a horrendous fate that should come by the end of the story. We are not yet at the end of the story. That being so, his fate is not yet to be delivered. Now, unless you're twelve, you should realize that not all good guys make it, and more often than not, the undeserving get to go up the corporate ladders. Chris being an example. Okay? Also, **suspects **that are caught, but need intensive medical help, are at first confined in a hospital before they are tried at court. At least, in civilized society, that's what they do. Side note, I didn't make Chris stronger, I just gave him an as of yet unrevealed advantage. The commissioner pointed out that if Leon really was inebriated, then he couldn't function 100, meaning Chris really could incapacitate him if he wanted to (crippling blows), and thus make Chris' claim of self-defense all the more believable. Since this isn't the case, then the commissioner is looking at foul play, not self-defense.

Clinton: Looks like you got me. When I make up a story, I think of a beginning and an end right off the bat, and its up to inspiration to put in stuff between points A and B. I just got inspired. And thanks for the review of Remember Heaven. Appreciated it. 

Author's note: Yes, this chapter would probably leave more questions unanswered. Also, I'm really sorry to anyone who was interested in this fic for the extremely long delay. College life is hectic, especially for guys like me who don't regard writing as their number one hobby.

Recap: Leon and Chris fight, leaving the former dead and the latter gravely wounded. Claire, after an interrogation, and an escort back to her apartment, snaps and fatally wounds officer Kevin Ryman, and then disappears. Chris and the commissioner finally talk, but all that remains are more unanswered questions, but this time, the commissioner suspects that Chris was more than willing to kill off his old friend, Leon.

**Chapter 6: "Surge"**

_"…What is it? What's wrong?" Leon could always feel Claire, an intrinsic connection between two hearts deeply connected. She didn't have to say a word, and he did not have to hear a thing. All he needed to do was feel. And he felt something wrong. It was six in the evening, and he had just got back to find Claire waiting, standing by the dining table. She was clad in red, vibrant and beautiful, but it seemed to be the only color on her entirety. "Leon…I have…something to confess…" she mumbled, unable to look her lover in the eye. "…" Leon took off his coat and rushed to her side. "Maybe…maybe you should drink first…" she offered, pushing a glass of water on the table towards him. "…Claire…" Leon did not care for a glass of water, but if she asked of it, then he would do it. Love was enough to strip him of his instinct, and as history has always shown, those foolishly bound by love are always those most vulnerable to despair. _

Claire held her breath as she slunk to the shadows, waiting for the red flashes of another patrol car to pass. "…" Glimpses of a life behind bars flashed to her mind along the wailing of the siren, teasing her of the future she would face if she ever got caught. Her breath precipitated in the cold, night air, a long gasp of soulless breath before she once again resumed her trek back to the heart of the city where her brother was being held. "…" As the patrol cars passed, she crept out of hiding and stood at the corner of the street, clutching her stomach as she did. She gazed at the street, lit an eerie orange thanks to the bright streetlights, where she could only imagine a memory of the past.

_Leon tore through the thankfully empty street in his Mazda, not caring to slow or stop for any reason. He felt his gun tempting him from his belt, screaming at him to deliver justice to his beloved's brother. Something felt wrong deep within him, like his intestines churning, his eyes glazing suddenly and then becoming perfectly fine again, but then, he did not care. All he could care about was the truth, and what it would entail. Claire's face flashed in his mind, and all manner of love and hate rushed into his confused heart. _

Chris stared at the ceiling, his body still barely mobile from the fight that he and Leon had. He could still feel the stitched wounds all over his torso burn, a feeling he forgot to handle since the time he was snared by a life of luxury. "…Claire…" he mumbled in the darkness, his eyes closing and his body reliving lost warmth. "…I miss you." he then uttered, imagining his sister lay beside him. _"What could you be up to now?" _he asked, half-expecting some mystic bond to force her voice into the dead air. _"Were you the one who sent Leon to kill me?" _

_"…No. No…just…no…" Leon's voice faltered as he faced Chris, his mind racing for perfectly logical ways to say that all this is a lie. "Now you know. Get out of here, Leon, I still have work to do." Chris hissed, his hands on his waist, before turning around and heading back for his office desk. "…No…no!" Leon took out his gun amidst his cries through gritted teeth, and trained it at the older man's head. "Fucking liar! Fucking, sick, son of a bitch!" _

The commissioner strode through the hall, an air of dread hung around him, like the edge of a secret that could not yet be unraveled, yet one that he was desperate to figure out. "Sir…" a thin man with the breath of cigarette butts stopped him in his tracks. "…Yes, John?" the commissioner asked, even though his eyes were at the young sergeant, it would seem to the more thoughtful that every other sense of his being was directed elsewhere. "Officer Ryman's…Kevin's car has been found…C.S.I. is over there now looking for any trace that Claire could have left behind." He explained, trying as best as he could not to show how much losing a member affected the force when they still needed work to do. "…And Kevin?" The commissioner asked. "Aya's with him." John responded, prompting the commissioner to nod in response. "Tell everyone to keep looking for Claire. If she resists arrest, then you can use whatever means necessary to subdue her." The commissioner then stated, before leaving the sergeant to give word.

"Sir…" Jessica stood up from her small desk as she saw the man she admired the most come into view.

"Did you get it?" asked the commissioner, his hand extended, as if it knew what the answer was.

"It's here." She responded, getting a small folder from beneath an envelope on her desk.

"Very good." He quickly grabbed the folder and pushed open the door to his office. "…Jessica." He stopped right before stepping into his office.

"Yes, sir?" she was still standing; she always waited for him to close the door before she sat down herself, a sign of courtesy to her superior.

"You make my life so much easier. Thank you." He said, in a voice soft and gentle, defiance to the hardened character that so many view him as.

"…Just doing my job, sir." She smiled, her spirit rising at the utterance of words so simple. "Oh, and tell everyone who wants to see me for the next fifteen minutes to stay away." He then added.

"Yes, sir."

The commissioner smiled and bowed his head for a second, before turning back to the matter at hand.

His private office was a dead cavern compared to the desks bustling with noise just outside. It was the way he wanted it, no excess or needlessness, just a small corner of the world where he could despise the burden of wisdom and experience and old age. He hung his coat on a hanger right by the door where he left his hat earlier that morning. All air left the commissioner's body by his second step, with his proud posture giving way to a slouching old man tired of a long day's horror. He fell on his leather seat, his elbows bracing themselves on his cold, wooden desk. After half a minute of silent rest, he opened the folder, in it the outgoing calls that Chris Redfield has made in the past month, and up to the point of his fateful encounter with Leon.

_"…Fancy that…" _whispered the commissioner in his mind, as he saw two phone numbers that he knew by heart, repeatedly contacted by the end of the list. _"…Chris…what were you doing?" _

_Claire stomped her foot on the ground, signaling that her patience was getting thinner. "What are you doing? Answer me!" she yelled, marching towards her brother and pulling away the clothes that he just put in his luggage. "I told you…I'm burned out." He simply responded, avoiding the flare in his sister's eye. "You're leaving me? Again?" she rushed in front of him and covered the closet that Chris was clearing out. "Get out of the way." He ordered, his voice unlike that of the sweet and caring brother that everyone thought of him as, but in a low, menacing growl that could have swayed any one else's spirit. But Claire was just as hard as her brother, and she did not find in her and urge to budge._

A soft drizzle began to hit the taxi's windows, condensing and reflecting the city lights into hazy beauty. Whereas newcomers to the land would always take a second or more to hold their breath and sit in awe at the beauty of industry, those who have seen past its bright lights and majestic skylines have always found no reason to look twice. Claire sat still, her eyes fixed on the road in front, with the taxi driver just as silent as she was. "…Are you sure, miss? Pio Del Pilar isn't exactly the friendliest neighborhood come night…" he then mentioned, the third time by the fifteen minute drive. "…I'll be fine." Claire responded, her eyes connecting with the driver's through the rearview mirror. _"I know who sleeps there…and he will pay…" _she vowed to herself, as the lights from outside grew dimmer and less frequent. _"I will show him how much I still love him…"_Claire began to run a hand slowly down her body, feeling the pain that has almost subsided, but reliving the moment in her mind nonetheless.

_With a deep growl, Chris pulled his sister down and squatted over her, thundering her with blows to her torso. Claire desperately covered herself, scratching at him at any window of opportunity, but her condition at that moment in time made her all the more weak. All the more susceptible to Chris' blows. After what could have been an eternity of searing pain, Claire finally gave in, and screamed for him to stop. Chris' hand halted right before it could connect to her face, and a familiar warmth of superiority began to come over him once again. He smiled. _

"Miss?" the taxi driver couldn't help notice the woman in the back seat close her eyes in thoughts that he could only imagine. Watching the road became all the more difficult, as he looked back to find Claire touching herself, almost as if the she was oblivious of the presence of the middle-aged man just a foot in front of her. With a soft sigh, Claire opened her eyes, fierce, fiery orbs that locked into the eyes of the driver. "Faster."

"What are you hiding?" the middle-aged woman asked softly, her arms crossed in front of her chest, almost as if they were looking to each other for any semblance of warmth. The body in question was stitched to a close, from clavicle to navel, while the entry wounds from the bullets left dark circles on his once perfect skin. No one should see him like this.

"Everything you need to know has already been sent to the evidence lab, ma'am." Mentioned an old man in a lab coat. "I'm sure you have enough clearance to investigate further." He continued.

"Yes. I just wanted to see him one more time." She responded, her eyes lingering on Leon's dead face, half-expecting it to suddenly open its eyes and begin to move. "…" The woman took off the sunglasses that she used to keep her short brown hair back, and wore it over her eyes. She did not want the old man to notice the tears that were beginning to form. "Put him back in." she then told the old man, who quickly followed his order.

"…?" as she turned to leave, her mobile phone rang, just monotonous beeping deprived of any personality. She gave the mortician one last glance before getting the phone from her handbag and exiting the room, answering it as she did.

"Hello?"

"So you really are in town." Answered an old man's voice, imperative but still refined.

"…Who is this?"

"I'm police commissioner Harvey Bullock. We need to talk."

"…This is about Chris, isn't it?"

"It sure is."

"I don't recall giving you my number."

"Well, you didn't. It's just listed here in Chris Redfield's phone bill."

"That's invasion of privacy, commissioner."

"And you haven't done naughtier things in your lifetime?"

"…" the woman smiled, once again beginning to feel the rush of urgency, a feeling that she sorely missed, and perennially desired. "I'll fill you in on the details when we meet." He then added, by which time the woman was already at the door to her silver Cadillac. It was parked by the side of the street, along a few other cars whose owners worked at night.

"There is no point in playing hard to get, is there?" she asked, impressed by the confidence the commissioner was showing.

"If anyone asks, I'll tell them I went through hell and high water to make you say yes."

"…Tomorrow at Caesar's. Ask for a Ms. Wonder Woman." She responded, already boarding her vehicle.

"Will do." And with that, the commissioner turned his phone off.

Jill Valentine turned off her mobile and put it back in her purse, preparing herself for the incoming storm. A surge of every emotion came back to her as memories of happier times were relived in her mind. _"All dead." _she thought, as she turned the engine on and headed back to her hotel. _"Chris…here comes the endgame." _

Author's note: Next chapter, Jill and Chris meet, but it will definitely not be a happy reunion for one of them. Also Chris' secret will be revealed, much to the horror of all societal norms. (Yeah, getting Jill in was a cheap way to solicit an interesting story, I know)


	7. Where I Am

Author's note: If I didn't mention it in the summary thing, this title is a mature thing, and I'm pretty sure readers that have gone through the previous chapters already know that. This one takes it a little further, to, discretion is SO advised.

Hotaru: For shame. Well, read on, see if your guess made the list.

**Chapter 7: "Where I Am"**

_ "It's not our baby." Claire told him. Leon just stood there, holding the now empty glass of water that she had him drink. The silence was deafening, and if there was anyone present there, they would swear that you could hear the grass sway and the birds flap their wings. "Leon…say something…"Claire pleaded, her face red, and her speech becoming almost incoherent by the end. "I…" the young man couldn't let a word out. There was a scream trying to pry itself loose from his mouth but something held it back. "Leon…"she again called, still pleading for him to do something, so that she herself would know what to do. But she still made the mistake of stepping closer._

Claire felt the side of her cheek as she leaned the back of her head on the edge of the bathtub, letting the warm water caress her body, wishing that it was someone who was holding her instead. _"Why did you have to play this the hard way?" _Claire asked in her mind, picturing her brother laid on a hospital bed, vulnerable, perfect. The door leading to the bedroom of the motel she was in was half open, so she could listen to the radio while she bathed. Michael Buble was singing some old song, and she let the notes sway and dance around her, forcing her to forget, at least for a moment, the hell that she was going through, and what she was about to do. She opened her eyes, looking out the door. The dead man's legs were still visible from behind the foot of the bed.

_ Chris leaned back, pulling the woman on top of him and cradling her between his legs. The marble floor felt like ice on his bare end, but he really didn't care. With a deep growl, Chris bit at the woman's breast, causing her to cry out in both pain and pleasure. He proceeded to cover every inch of her chest with his tongue as she willingly sat up and down on his manhood. Soon enough, their muscles tensed and readied as their excitement grew too much to control. "Oh, god, Chris!" the young woman yelled as she and he both felt the explosion in their bodies, sucking away all their energy into a single focal point. Chris fell back, with the woman collapsing on top of him. "…Get__ off." __He whispered, gathering enough strength to push the woman to her side. _

"Knock, knock." Entered the commissioner, breaking off Chris' sweet memory. "Jesus, don't you people…!" the injured man snapped, startled at the sudden intrusion.

"I said, knock, knock." the older man then retorted, raising an eyebrow as he noticed a red-faced Chris fumble beneath the sheets.

"…Sorry, I was just…" Chris began to fluster, embarrassed, with a voice that resumed the role of victim.

"…busy?" finished the commissioner. He did not need to be the sharpest person to see that Chris was covering something up.

"It gets…pretty lonely here." the younger man explained, averting the commissioner's eyes.

"Do you know what an methamphetamine does, Chris?"

"…I'm sorry?" Chris responded, not because he didn't know, but because he wanted to find out why it would be related to him.

"Methamphetamines." reiterated the commissioner, taking out a cigarette and placing it in his mouth.

"…This is a non-smoking zone. That means smoking isn't allowed. In this zone." Chris immediately pointed out.

"They're drugs, Chris. Did you know that?" continued the commissioner, practically oblivious to Chris' previous comments.

"…I'll call security. There's a button beside my bed…that…" Chris then brought up, either getting irritated, or getting more defensive.

"We found a significant dose inside Leon's body. So much that it didn't dissolve hours after ingestion."

"…I don't understand."

"I've had the pleasure of seeing Leon Kennedy in action, Chris. All that training he had…"

"You're saying he should have killed me."

"Without the drugs warping him up, possibly, yes."

"Possibly." Chris resigns, even in his arrogance, was not able to deny that Leon was someone he couldn't handle head on, and in a fair fight.

"…Coincidence that he trips up, the same night you end up killing him?"

"I don't know anything about it."

"Is that right?"

"Commissioner, I told you before, and I'll tell you again, it was self-defense. He came at me!"

"And you don't know why."

"Maybe it was the drugs." Chris then explained. "You said he was high."

"Uh-huh. Right. Tell me though, so why you? He was all hopped up and ready to shoot someone, why didn't he just pick a fight with the first person he saw? Why you?"

"You're charging me with something, commissioner?"

"You're awfully up to speed."

"…" Chris was already breathing deep, a mixture of physical difficulty, and mental aggravation.

"I'm sorry, I'm not hearing an answer." the old man then contined to taunt, one could say blindly, almost as if he was so determined to pin the death of Leon on Chris.

"Because I don't know what else to tell you!" Chris lashed out, catching the commissioner off guard.

"…"

"All right then, give me a motive. Give ma a reason to want to kill that man." The young man then challenged, vigor clearly returning to his voice.

"…"

"…I'm calling security, now."

"…Well, I guess I'm going to be leaving then."

"Good."

"Anyway, unless we get to link the drugs to you, you can…" the commissioner waved his fist up and down, signaling what Chris was doing before the old man stepped in. "…all you want. But I am telling you this, being a hero in the past does not exempt you from the law today."

"I never said I was a hero." Chris responded in a softer tone, his eyes distant, as if something of a significant memory stirred beneath them.

"Well, I'll be seeing you, Chris. I'm sorry that we couldn't talk under better circumstances." the old man then said, turning around and heading for the door.

"You seem to be having a field day with this." Chris quickly shot back, before the commissioner could leave. "Trying to make a name for yourself, commissioner?"

"I'm just doing my job, Chris." he responded, not bothering to look back, before he stepped out and closed the door behind him.

Aya sat down and rested her head on her desk, using her folded arms as cushions. "Hey, Brea." greeted Rita, another officer that had a distinct southern accent about her. Like Aya, she had short, blonde hair, and a body that made a lot of men sign up for service. "…Rita." she didn't bother raising her head to acknowledge the other official, seeing those previous moments where she could at least close her eyes as manna from heaven. Besides, they were good friends. "I hear the commissioner was going all out in this case. Emily's pulling files left and right for him." she reported, sitting on an empty chair beside her.

"Oh? Like what?" Aya asked, pulling out her hand just in time for a cop with a bag of donuts passing by to notice.

"Well, last time, she got a hold of Chris Redfield's outgoing calls from his mobile. Now, he had Emily find Claire's." Rita responded, shaking her head when the cop with the donuts offered her one.

"I thought you were going low carb." Rita reminded Aya, who was busy taking a big bite out of the donut.

"Yeah. I don't really care about my diet right now." Aya replied, still eating, her speech nearly a slur thanks to her fatigue. "Anyway, what did the commish find out?" she then asked, looking at the donut and wondering where to bite it next.

"Well, I heard from Emily, that Chris and Claire had two things in common." Rita whispered, almost like a teenager gossiping to a girlfriend.

"They have 'C' as a first letter?" Aya asked, raising an eyebrow at Rita.

"Other than that."

"Tell me already. Or I'm telling David you like him." Aya teased.

"…Okay, both of them called Jill Valentine an awful lot of times."

The afternoon sun seared down, even through the large umbrellas that protruded from the middle of the small, round tables outside the café. Jill took a sip from her frap, her eyes, hidden behind a pair of sunglasses, closely examining everyone around. A good number of people still recognized her, and unlike Chris, she was not about the attention. But then again, she wasn't at all hard to ignore, wearing a white blazer, coupled with a pair of pants that were the same color, and a red scarf that hung down from her neck, she looked more like a cutout from an issue of Vogue.

"Aren't you the vision?" asked an elderly gentleman who came up to her.

"Hello, commissioner." she greeted, gesturing for him to sit down.

"So…" he immediately began as he sat down. "…I'm sure you've heard about what happened. A woman with your connections." he said, referring to her close friendship with a female reporter who escaped Raccoon city as well. "It wasn't Alyssa who told me." Jill was quick to point out, taking a sip from her tea.

"And may I ask who tipped you off?"

"I have my ways. But don't worry, it's not anyone of your men."

"Thank goodness. I wouldn't want to kill anyone of them."

"I heard about officer Ryman as well. I'm sorry."

"No offense to Kevin, but he is the least important issue at the moment."

"Well, let's get started."

"Chris seemed to be…confiding in you. We pulled his phone record and for the last month, you and him seemed to have a lot to talk about."

"If I tell you it's personal?"

"Then I'm afraid going to have to ask you to make it public."

"…" Jill smiled, taking off her sunglasses, revealing her beautiful, green eyes. "He wanted to see me."

"Is that all?" he asked her. Jill neatly folded her sunglasses and placed them on the table, beside the small plate that her cup of tea was sitting on.

"Yes. He wanted to see me. I move a lot, that's why it was difficult to plan anything, and he had to call so often." she said, her eyes connected straight into the old man's. "I see." he said, pressing his palms together. He was wise enough to see a lie when it was thrown at his face, and she was not lying.

"You knew Leon well, right?" he then asked.

"Well enough."

"Did he ever have, you know this is off the record, but did he ever have an addiction? To drugs?"

"…Yes." she said answered in a whisper, though seemingly dispassionate.

"Oh." the commissioner responded, almost in disappointment. Leon being a habitual user would undermine the case that he was somehow drugged.

"…He isn't the only one." Jill then continued, catching the commissioner's interest. 'Your C.S.I. must be pretty fresh if they couldn't find Chris' stash." she teased, once again refreshing herself with her tea.

"What?"

"If you can't bring him in for homicide, commissioner, then how about for possession?"

_"Get off…" he whispered, gathering enough strength to push the woman to her side. Claire was still gasping for air as she lay there, half-naked, as her brother stood back up and fixed himself, before resuming his work on the luggage. "Chris…" she called, though he did not know, or care for whatever intention it was. She began to sit up, picking her clothes up from the floor and putting them on, slowly. Chris was ignoring her. "Don't forget the deal…" she whispered, still there on the floor, and Chris flashed her an angry look. Without another word, Chris slammed his luggage to a close and stormed out of the room. "I won't make you forget…"she vowed as he pulled herself up from the floor, massaging her throbbing opening. _

Author's note: There you have it. More questions than answers!


	8. Living Hate

Hotaru: Ick is right, but hey, it wouldn't be me if I revealed the big twist at just chapter 7, right? Anyway, thanks for the support. It really means a lot to me.

Solid Snake91: Yeah, so you've read my other stories? Whoa, thanks for that. Most people just read Remember Heaven and never return. Hehe, anyway, yeah, some stories I connect, others, like this, I don't. I'll get to sorting them. But Rivers and Legacy are connected.

**Author's note: **Chapter 8 is finally here, which is more or less just a set-up for the hell I'll be breaking loose next chapter. Enjoy!

**Chapter 8: "Living Hate" **

It was already beginning to get dark outside. She could already hear the dusk wind blowing against the glass behind the drawn curtains. They sounded more like fingers clawing more than anything else, spirits of the ruined who could not find rest. "…" She did not want her imagination to get the best of her. Strengthening her posture, she turned the doorknob and opened the door. Claire stopped as she exited her motel room, as not to bump into an overweight man in a suit, and a young woman by his shoulder. He looked to be in his forties, obviously only capable of finding a girl who needed the money. The woman was still young, probably new at the game that she probably would be spending the rest of her days in.

"Excuse me…" she absent-mindedly muttered as she tried to get past, but the couple didn't budge. "Hey, I know you…you're Claire! Claire Redfield!" cried the excited woman as she realized who it was. The man seemed to follow in his escort's enthuse, as Claire was still viewed as a celebrity by the populace. Unfortunately for her, the door to the room that she came from was still half-open, and the corpse of the man inside was still sprawled on the floor. "…" The sudden interruption dumbfounded Claire, as she already felt that it was too long since she last made a face for the public. She had almost forgotten how. "Hi." She simply responded, with the best smile she could muster.

"Could we take a picture with you?" the man asked, already reaching in his pocket for his mobile phone.

"Uh…sure." Claire responded, with her hand reaching back to try and get the doorknob so she could close the door. Luck however, had other plans. A sudden strong gust of wind blew right across the three individuals, pushing the door wide open. _"Fuck…" _

Aya closed her eyes, relishing the rest it gave her tired face, even if it was just for but a moment. She opened them again at the sound of the chime, with the elevator doors opening in front of her. A middle-aged man stepped in ahead of her, keeping his thumb on the door's 'open' button for the young woman. "What floor?" he asked as she entered. "Fourth, please." She responded. He complied, and then pressed the button for the sixth floor where he was going to get off. It was just the two of them inside. Both of them were covered in long dark overcoats, as if any sign of color could mislead someone that there was still something other than despair in their souls.

"Um…aren't you Aya? Aya Brea?" the man asked. He was in his thirties, unshaved, but still looking respectable. The fluorescent light above them made his eyes look more sunken than they were.

"…Yeah, I'm sorry, do I know you?" she asked, a little surprised that a man she doesn't remember recognized her.

"Oh, you don't…Evans. Chris Evans. I'm on parole."

"Oh? Oh! I remember you, the bank thing. Getaway car, right? Sorry, I'm just not good with faces."

"Yeah. You came out of nowhere, literally kicked me through the side window…" He smiled at her as he talked, the sincerest smile she's seen in days, ironically coming from a random person in an elevator. "Good behavior, they said." He then said.

"That's nice. So, parole? You'd better not be doing anything out of the ordinary." She warned him jokingly, knowing full well that she was more than capable of taking him down again should he try anything.

"Anything to keep my nose away from your boot." He responded, keeping a lighthearted demeanor that seemed to betray his muscular frame.

"Sorry about that. Job and all."

"I'm not. At least the dizziness made me see clearer. Does that… make sense?"

"I think it does." The chime rang again, signaling that they were already on the fourth floor. "This is where I get off…" Aya remarked, somewhat disappointed that the first conversation she had in what seemed like an age, which wasn't devoted to a Redfield, had to end so soon. "Congratulations on your parole." She then said as she stepped out, turning to him and flashing a smile. "Thank you." He responded, waving to her once, and then the doors closed.

"…" Aya's smile lingered as she walked down the hall, painted with a soft shade of pink and peach just so that it could look uniform with the pre-natal, just the floor above. There was a young nurse who passed her by, muttering something about reading the prescription wrong. It didn't take long for Aya's mind to get grounded back in reality, as the pressure of having to capture Claire began to hound at her neck.

The corridor felt like it got narrower and narrower as Aya made her way to past a countless array of doors, finally stopping at room 410. "…" Aya wanted to go back here after she'd land Claire in jail. Only to have a face to show to him. But she needed the comfort. And the escape. With her heart still heavy, she knocked thrice, and then turned the steel knob. A rush of warm air met her, invitingly, caressing her with a taste of a haven locked in the small room ahead.

"Hey." She greeted, seeing the bedridden young man look at her with compassionate eyes. Kevin already had color in his cheeks again, and it was enough to make Aya be as a child again.

"Sorry for the scare. I hate my lungs now. My lungs are bad." He apologized, jokingly, as his eyes followed her walk up to his side. "I'm glad you're okay. That embolism had nothing on you." She answered.

"Yeah…my own body tried to kill me, ironic. Was I dead or anything?"

"For a couple of seconds, I think. Your rep skyrocketed back in the precinct."

"A good side to everything?" he teased, with his voice as tender as the day they first met. Aya smiled and nodded, taking a seat on the stool beside the bed. "I always said you were in desperate need of a vacation. This is God's way of agreeing with me." She teased him, while gently poking him on the rib.

"Hey, I'm the one with the bullet hole; let me sit on the pedestal." He joked back, gently pushing her hand away, but not letting go. Both their hands were callused by years of war, of blood and honor. Yet with each other, their hands felt soft, innocent. "I promise I'll get her for you." Aya then told him, drawing closer. Kevin furrowed his brow, and held Aya's hand tighter. "Hey, there's plenty of time to talk about work when I'm back on my feet. But not right now…right now…let's just…"

Aya looked at their hands entwined, and then returned her gaze to meet Kevin's. "Okay."

The commissioner walked down the hall in dead silence, only responding to the officers' greetings with a casual raise of the eyebrows. "Commissioner." greeted Emily as he walked into her view. "Get me Crime Lab." He immediately instructed, not even giving her a second of a glance as he stepped into his office and forcefully closed the door behind him. "…Yes sir…" Emily muttered, knowing full well that she wouldn't be heard, as she got back to her desk and did as she was told. _"This is too easy. This is…just…" _With a sigh of frustration, the commissioner got down on his chair and rested his feet up on the desk. _"Been too long in this fucking job. Can't believe that the only thing I need to convict Chris Redfield is getting handed to me in a silver platter. It's just too convenient." _The old man closed his eyes, replaying the conversation he had with Jill Valentine earlier that morning, every word, every physical gesture that the woman made. And it was only in his memory that something dawned on him. _"What does Jill get for all of this?" _he asked himself, and with that his eyes opened, and he took his feet of his desk.

A second later, the phone began to ring, and the commissioner wasted no time picking it up. "Commissioner." Greeted a male voice, one that was already showing signs of fatigue. "Hey, I need you to check something for me." The old man quickly announced, getting straight to the point.

"Lead?"

"Hunch. Check for any files Chris may have on Jill. Anything you can get at all."

"Anything else?"

_"Yeah. Jill said that you can find the drugs behind the painting…"_ the commissioner thought. "When he was admitted to the hospital, you already had a tox report from his blood and urine, right?" he then asked, wishing that the answer would be the one he wanted.

"Yeah. Anything of it?"

"…Were there any traces of drugs? Any drugs?"

"No. There weren't. Why?" came the response. The commissioner closed his eyes and rubbed his temple with his free hand. He felt his heart sunk as the truth began to set in. Chris may be telling the truth.

"Nothing." He finally said after a moment of silence, cursing under his breath.

"Is that all?"

"Yeah. Thank you."

With a loud sigh, the commissioner stood up. Once again putting on his brown trench coat, and letting his hand slide over his holstered gun. He was always able to sense things some other people could not, some sort of strange clairvoyance that didn't make him feel ghosts or demons, but rather, the feeling of an impending truth. Of closure. That somehow, he knew that something was about to happen, that could very well signal the end of his story.

Claire leaned in front of the mirror, carefully putting on a fresh shade of red lipstick. "You've got nice taste." She remarked, glancing over at the dead, naked, body of the woman. She pleaded less than the man in the suit, whose own lifeless corpse took a part of the floor. Both of them had the back of their heads blown off by a .45 auto. "Cute clothes too…"

The commissioner opened the drawer by the wall, just a few steps away from his chair. Incandescent light seemed to sparkle from the bottle pf chardonnay he had inside, almost bathing it in a surreal glow. "Ah…Betty, maybe I can break my promise to you just this once…" he mumbled under his breath, glancing at the portrait of his deceased wife back on his desk. He could feel warmth comforting him as he stared into his wife's face. 'Wait for me sweetheart." With half a smile, he made his way back to his chair, with the only comfort in the world he had left.

Still inside the motel, a smile lingered on Claire's face as she watched herself in the full-body mirror, wearing the clothes of her most recent victim. It was a smooth, brown, leather jacket that fitted her perfectly, looking like the top of a cat suit more than anything else. Underneath was a red halter top, just the same color as her lips were, and a black miniskirt that could have exposed her underwear if it were an inch shorter. "…I can't wait till Chris sees me in these…" she whispered to no one in particular. Not that she needed anyone else, anyone besides her brother.

The light, green wine swirled in the glass, bouncing off light like a constantly moving jewel. Once upon a time, the commissioner could just let the waves carry him off into the new shore, where he could forget all the noise and violence that plagued him in his waking moments. He relished the cold touch that met his lips, dreaming of the days back when it was a woman whom made him feel as such. The sound of knocking then drew him back to reality.

Claire slowly trailed her finger up and down the barrel of the .45, almost as if relishing it as a companion and not a weapon. "I'll have to get me more of you when this is all over…" she whispered, as she gently tucked it into her handbag. "I'll be taking you, too." She muttered out loud as she slipped a flick knife into the waist of her skirt. Turning around, she looked at the small massacre she just committed, not feeling a single emotion for the now, empty faces that stared right back at her. "Goodbye." She softly remarked as she made her way to the door. _'Chris…I'm off to see you now…" _

Emily entered the commissioner's office, standing much like a school girl would in front of a principal. "I'm going out for awhile. If anything should…happen to me, then…I asked forensics to check out some documents. Make sure Aya gets to read them. Just tell her to connect the dots." He instructed. "Sir?" Emily took a step forward, shaking her head. "I don't understand." In a lot of ways, she was still young. She still looked at the old man, as if waiting for him to stand and at the least graze her skin with his. But at least then, she knew that it was not love.

"You're a good girl, Emily. I have no doubt in my mind that you'll make it big someday."

"…"

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have somewhere I need to be."

"…"

"…I'm paying Chris a visit one more time."

Author's note: In the next chapter of The Rose and the Estuary, the commissioner finally sets his sights, and the barrel of his revolver, on the psychotic, exaggeratedly sexual Claire Redfield. But we all know Claire won't be going down without a gunfight, or the offer of a BJ. Who will win? Place your bets now! (Lame, much?)


	9. Here and There

**Author's note: **Here we are, the confrontation that no one has been waiting for! This is the penultimate chapter for this story. And God knows that I won't let things end without a bang, before the big bang.

**TeK**Hey there, haven't heard from you in ages. (And that DID hurt my review count)Anyway, thanks for the compli, and as for how I put characters in scenarios normal people wouldn't want to be in? Well, maybe I'm just a little mad myself :p

**Solid Snake91: **Yeah, I wasn't exactly in one of my more inspired stages with that chapter. This chapter comes in extra long, just for you (and for the fact that I didn't realize it would take this long) But still, thanks, I'm officially printable now. J

**Hotaru**Awww, hug. Okay, for you, here's some more sex and violence, loony style ; )

**Recap: **Leon Kennedy is dead, Chris is hospitalized, apparently framed for homicide. Jill has surfaced with her own hidden agenda. The police commissioner had an epiphany about the truth behind the violence, and he sets out to confront the recovering Chris Redfield one more time, not knowing that the savage Claire Redfield is also on her way to meet her brother. She already put Officer Kevin Ryman in terminal condition by viciously layering him with bullets at close range, killed three innocent people without hesitation, and is still hungry for closure. Will the battle hardened commissioner be strong enough to stop her bloody rampage? Or will her reign of death take a new victim?

**Chapter 9: "Here and There"**

_"Destiny?" Aya raised an eyebrow, not used to hearing Kevin talk about such things. _

_"Yeah…do you believe in it?" he asked. _

_"…No, I…I don't think so…no."_

_'Why not?" _

_"It's just, if there's destiny, if we, well…"_

_"What is it?"_

_"If we already have all our lives, our futures mapped out for us, then…why bother? Why do what we do? I mean, there's no freedom."_

_"Oh." _

_"You?"_

_"Hard to say."_

_"Just a yes or a no."_

_"I'm not decided, I guess." _

_"You're guessing you can't decide?"_

_"I guess so." _

The commissioner looked up, watching the stars glitter beyond the horizon. Shades of violet mixed with the dark blue carpet of the sky, making the old man wonder what was out there. Was someone watching them? Was there someone out there, higher, supreme, that laughed and cried along with the joy and misery of the human animal. Humans doing what it is they do, caring only for themselves and for the people they know, not even knowing about the existence of millions more. How at that moment, somewhere in the world, someone was making love, greeting death, crying, living. How their existence, how their names and lives, do not exist in the commissioner's own, and how his, was equally absent in theirs."…" The old man shook his head, leveling his gaze to what was in front of him. He was in a narrow alley that stretched forward for a few more feet, diverging into two wider passages, left and right, both of them leading to the wider streets.

_"I mean, there are things that happen that are too…convenient, is that the right word? Coincidental." _

_"…"_

_"Okay, uh…when I was sixteen, I remember this…I flunked algebra, freshman year in high school. I didn't let my parents know."_

_"Typical." _

_"Hey, hear me out."_

_"Okay, sorry, sorry." _

_"So there I was, playing my SNES, with my problem at school nagging at me and I couldn't concentrate."_

There was something missing. Something that could not be buried under a plastic smile and a cold heart. It was emptiness. A void in place of where happiness and comfort should be. Claire felt a strong gust of wind come from behind, pushing her forward. In Japanese culture, the winds of change are a powerful symbolism. They meant a many different things, from subtle reforms to social upheavals. Claire always began to wonder about the world when the wind blew. She thought of where it passed, who it passed, what it swept away, or brought to someone, and where it would go next. How something so lifeless, so arbitrary, could touch so many lives. All lives. It made her think of how big the world really was. _"Where are you taking me?" _she thought as the wind kept on forcing her to go forward. _"To Chris…yes… our secret…I get to see you now…"_

_"I hope we're not talking about life altering epiphanies here, because…summer classes? Not exactly the tragedy of epic proportions."_

_"It doesn't have to be, Aya. Epic I mean. I…actually, I didn't know how serious it was. Yeah, to us now, something like summer class is just nothing, right? But back then, don't you remember being a kid? School meant a lot."_

_"…Yeah. I remember the feeling."_

_"Of course you do, you were scoring honors left and right."_

_"That was just my senior year."_

_"You were awarded a recognition award._

_'Who doesn't nowadays?"_

_"…for not having a single absence since prep!"_

_"Wha-how did you even know that? We're not batch mates!"_

_"I saw the award on top of your drawer once."_

_'Well… I find that good education and good hygiene should come hand in hand."_

_"Anyway, yeah, so there I was, wasting my time with Street Fighter or something, and then all of a sudden, you know what happened?" _

With a sigh, the commissioner took off his thick-framed glasses, wiping them with his handkerchief. A sudden blast of steam from one of the basements' ventilation managed to blur out his lenses, forcing him to stop to clean them. He could hear footsteps coming from the passage to the right, which as only about eleven feet away, but paid no heed. _"…Why don't they put secret hospitals somewhere more accessible?" _he thought to himself, noticing a blurry figure coming into view. It came from the right passage, steadily making her way to the left, not stopping to glance, or perhaps not noticing, at the old man. _"…?" _Placing back the handkerchief in his pocket, the old man put his glasses back on; finally learning who it was just a few feet away. _"Claire…!" _With that single realization, the old man's heart began to pound like a drum. Without waiting for another breath, he drew out his gun, a magnum revolver. The sudden movement made Claire take notice, maybe to late, that the old man, with his right arm, was aiming right at her.

_"Bam!"_

_"Bam? Kevin, you suddenly exploded?" _

_"No! I mean… then all of a sudden, bam, the outlet suddenly short circuits and sparks fly. I mean literally."_

_"Okay."_

_´My hand turned black and all when pulled it out the socket."_

_"How…life changing."_

_´Thing is, nothing like that ever happened before. I mean, I was a techie, knew how AC/DC shit like that worked, but that, that was…I couldn't explain how it happened."_

_"Still not getting how this is destiny."_

_"On account that you don't let me finish?" _

_"Oh." _

_"Kidding, kidding, I…it's just that I've been thinking about it for a long time, and it's the first time I actually talked about it." _

_"Okay, sorry. So…what happened next?"_

Claire's eyes widened for a second, caught off guard, but it didn't take long for her instincts to take over. For the two of them time began to slow down, though everything took mere moments to transpire. All of a sudden, she pulled back to her right, rotating backward, with her purse in her left hand, her right reaching into it. Finishing her motion, Claire pulled out the .45 she was hiding, popping the safety and ready to return fire by the time she was facing the old man. At the same time, the sudden movement made the nervous man's finger act on impulse, pulling the trigger and opening fire. It was the first shot fired, breaking the glass of silence and opening the door to chaos. The bullet flew right where Claire originally was, hitting the brick wall, strong enough to send particles and dust spray outward. _"…Shit!" _It was too long since the commissioner fired a gun, and with a single hand at that. The recoil made it impossible for him to reposition in time, at least not before Claire had her turn with him. _"Got'cha!"_ Claire thought as she returned fire.

_"So now that my SNES was busted, I really didn't have anything to do for the rest of my Saturday. So…I call Ryan. You remember him, right? Ryan Vazquez?" _

_"Yeah, I remember." _

_"Yeah, so I call him up, ask him if he's got anything planned, and he said he wanted to just hang in campus. Probably play hoops or something. So I decided to come with." _

_"Uh-huh. He loved basketball."_

_"He really did." _

_"You didn't." _

_"Nothing else to do."_

_"Admit it, you like ogling boys."_

_"That why I fell for you, miss I can kick anyone's ass without worrying about split ends?"_

_"…So, yeah, so what happened next?" _

At least his feet were still in good shape. The commissioner didn't bother readjusting his aim, opting instead to make a dive to his left where a green dumpster stood. It should be enough to give him cover from Claire's gun. A bullet flew nearly right through him, clipping the end of his trench coat instead. He felt the vacuum push his coat, nearly pulling him along with it. He didn't know where her two other gunshots went, only glad that he was still intact. With his elbows crossed in front of him, he landed beside the dumpster, rolling forward where his legs hit the wall. A small, black garbage bag left beside the dumpster managed to take the brunt of his fall. Claire's last shot however, managed to clip the edge of the dumpster, sending out a large fragment of shrapnel that tore into the commissioner's cheek. _"…Suck it in! Suck it in!" _the old man ordered himself, taking every fiber of his being not to scream in pain as the blood poured down his chin. It's been too long. He's too old. _"Don't let her get too close to spray, don't let her…" _

_"Then she saw me." _

_"Who?"_

_"My homeroom adviser. Turns out that she forgot something in the faculty room so she had to go back. In that short window of time, in that huge campus, she and I saw each other." _

_"…"_

_"And she asked me, how I was, if I got into a summer school already, because it turned out, that it was the last week for enrolling in summer class. And I didn't even know." _

Still using the dumpster as cover, the commissioner quickly got on his stomach, extended his right arm and fired a shot blindly, hoping that it would prevent Claire from closing in on him. It worked. With a shocked cry, Claire fell back as a bullet flew past her, so close that she heard the vacuum of air that it left in its track. _"Bastard!" _Claire followed the commissioner and rolled to her right, using the other end of the dumpster as temporary cover. Both of them were now leaning on opposite ends. It was then that the silence once again swallowed them, as each one waited for the other to move. Only six feet of steel separated them now. _"…Come on old man…show me what you've got…"_Claire then felt the pressure in the area shift, realizing that the old man was already making a move. _"I'm faster than you…" _With a twisted smile, Claire jumped to her feet and aimed at the commissioner's direction. Something moved upward, something fast. _"…!" _Claire didn't even have time to know what it was, as her instinct took over, forcing her to pull the trigger. Bullseye.

_"So what my teacher does, is she calls my mom. She was at home."_

_"Uh-oh." _

_"Uh-oh is right. So my mom tells my dad, and by the time I got home, I got this entire barrage of sermons from my parents. I mean, really, the neighbors heard it, I think the dogs started barking…and those were some really lethargic dogs…and after all that, they tell me to clean myself up so we could find a summer school."_

_"Wow. That must suck." _

_"Yeah. Horrific much." _

_"…Wait, you mean, that was the year that you and I…?'_

_"…Yep." _

Claire's mouth hung open as she watched the bullet tear right through a black garbage bag, sending its contents flying backward. She really was fast. And the old man knew it. Her eyes immediately shot down to the side of the dumpster, where the commissioner was on the floor, resting on his right shoulder, his revolver aimed straight for her. _"…No…" _For a second, their eyes locked, and that was only when Claire noticed the fury in the old man's glare. Her body tensed, signaling that she was making a move, still under the notion that she was faster than lightning. But before Claire could even aim her gun on him, the old man pulled the trigger, this time, finding its mark. Her notion was dismissed. Another loud crack filled the void. _"Got you now you crazy bitch!" _A sharp, searing pain erupted in Claire's shoulder, so much that it took out the air in her system, forcing her to simply gasp out loud in both shock and pain.

_"You remember now, Aya? That was the summer that I needed to do an extra job to actually pay for my remedials…"_

_"The summer that we first met." _

_"Yep. So I keep on thinking…if, if my SNES didn't suddenly short circuit, if my parents didn't enroll me at the last minute in Stoneville High, the only place still accepting, near the café that you always went in…" _

_"…The café that you began working in…" _

_"I think that all that…it's more than a coincidence."_

_"…destiny?" _

Claire felt her feet leave the ground for more than a second, as the force of the bullet literally sent her flying back. The wind blew hard, making her feel like she was sailing through the air. It didn't make the pain go away. The commissioner narrowed his eyes as he watched the girl land on the back of her head with a sickening crack. A sound that gave him comfort. He was winning. _"…oh…hurts…never been shot…always…never…" _Claire began to breathe louder as she tried to suppress the pain, finding herself staring at the beautiful night sky. There were so many stars. She clenched her right hand, feeling nothing but air. _"…where's my gun…? Dropped…dropped it?" _Her heart began to race as she heard the old man's footsteps draw closer. Closer. Closer. _"She's down… call for a paramedic…no, the hospital is just a block away…can't involve dispatch…get her stitched up and throw her in jail…and finally…huh?" _The commissioner stopped as he watched the young woman begin to giggle, slowly sitting herself up. "Freeze. Or I make sure the next one counts." The old man threatened, stopping in his tracks, just a step away from Claire.

"Is that what you really want?" she asked him in reply, her voice still a slur, almost like a whisper, from the shock in her system.

"…No sudden…" he repeated.

"What?" she asked, cutting him off, in a sultry, playful tone. Claire was now staring down the barrel of the gun. But she's been through worse. She was on her knees, with the commissioner looming over her like the shadow of inevitability. She was still breathing heavily, almost seductively, as she slowly took her jacket off. "You… had the perfect shot…but you didn't take it. Why? Maybe…" her eyes then locked into his, and with a trembling hand, she began to trail her fingers from her navel, to her breast. Violence always was psychologically connected to sex. It was something she knew, and was very much capable to exploit. Moreover, she was willing to. "…how long since the last time you fucked a girl, commissioner?"

"…" The old man didn't flinch, still keeping the gun trained at the young woman's face.

"Do you miss it commissioner? How warm it feels?" the young woman then lowered her right hand, sliding it between her thighs. "Come on…you can have my pussy if you want it…" she was still on her knees, thighs stretched wide apart, hoping that the commissioner would like to see more. _"Come on old man…"_she then began to move her hand under the cloth.

"…You… have the right to remain silent…" he started, cocking his gun again just to show that he meant business.

_"…Fuck! Just push it!" _Claire suddenly leaned forward, parted her scarlet lips, and with a crooked smile, began to suggestively engulf gun's barrel with her mouth. It worked. The old man stopped, shocked as he watched the girl began to trail her tongue up and down the barrel of the gun. Moaning and whimpering as she worked on the gun. She let the sour taste of gunpowder drip out of her saliva as her tongue reached the chamber of the gun. Her head was leaning to the left now, safe from a bullet's path. _"This girl really is crazy…" _the old man thought, his mouth now hung open, watching a savagely sexual display like this for the very first time.

_"Now!"_Without warning, she grabbed the gun with her left hand and with a loud shriek, quickly pushed it upward, further away from her face.

_'Fu-!" _The commissioner let off another startled shot that once again hit nothing but brick, and before he could re-maneuver himself, he saw Claire pull out the flick knife with her right hand. She kept it under her skirt after all, waiting for the right time to take it out and use it. It takes a man of physical perfection one and a half seconds to knowingly react to something. That was half a second more than the old man had, as Claire immediately plunged the blade in the side of his stomach.

He let out a cry of anguish, as the sudden bolt of pain made him lose balance, forcing him to fall back with Claire quickly landing on top of him. Her left hand was still clamped on the handle of the commissioner's gun, keeping it planted on the cold pavement. 'Die! Die, you old fuck, die!" Claire screamed at the top of her lungs, pushing the knife deeper into the side of the old man's stomach. With a loud growl, the commissioner grabbed Claire's hand, attempting to pull it, along with the knife, off of his system. _"…!" _The young woman complied, realizing that the spot she hit wasn't vital enough to make the wound fatal. With another shriek, she pulled the knife out of him and raised it over her read, ready to finish the job.

"No!" The old man raised his arm to cover his face, letting the knife tear into his arm, just beneath the elbow. _"Suck it in! Suck it in!" _he thought to himself, letting the pain drive him forward. She stabbed him again, and once again, the old man used his arm to save himself, resulting in another deep wound. Both of their hearts were now beating like drums, as the adrenaline to survive pushed them to ignore the pain racking their bodies. Claire raised the knife again, and this time, the old man had enough concentration to find realize where she was ready to bury it.

With another siren cry, the young woman slammed her knife down, but this time, the commissioner managed to grab her wrist with his free hand. The tip of the blade was just an inch above the lens of his glasses. All his years in the force, and it was the first time he stared at the tip of a blade that close. Claire gritted her teeth as she tried to push further, her eyes now glaring with anger. But not just that. Something shone in her eyes, a sensation she almost forgot, the feeling of desperation. She was Claire Redfield. She was not going to be taken down by a man no one would remember.

"No, no one is taking him away from me!" she creamed. "I'll kill you! I'll kill you! I'll kill…" Claire then noticed a movement to her left, one that she just found out, since her attention was transfixed on the knife looming over the old man's eye. The old man held his breath as he watched Claire's slow realization that he just inverted his grasp of his gun, now using his small finger to hold the trigger, with his thumb pressed against the base of the handle to tilt it forward. She was now in range.

_"Oh…!" _Claire quickly pulled back just as the commissioner pulled the trigger, sending out a pot shot that violently grazed her left temple. It gave the old man enough room to maneuver, and he immediately managed to hoist his right leg up and then kicked the lunatic off. _"On your feet!" _the old man urged himself as he quickly pushed himself off the floor. He however, didn't expect that the young woman was also fueled by adrenaline, that her pain and stubbornness wouldn't let her think of anything else but retribution.

In the field, there are always two kinds of people who get hurt. They are the ones who are either too new to realize the danger, or so old to believe that danger was no longer applicable to them. Claire was the latter. She sprang back up at him, letting out one final war cry, as she lunged at the old man with the knife. _"No!" _The commissioner fell back once again, this time to avoid Claire's swing. He immediately got on all fours, facing away from Claire, and immediately attempted to bolt for the clear direction. _"Get out of her range!" _he thought, as Claire swung again, catching only the end of the commissioner's trench coat since he already got to his feet. "Die!" she screamed again, just as the old man made a quick turn around, once again facing her, his gun aimed to kill.

Another gunshot rang out, and a sense of immeasurable agony suddenly bore its way into Claire, violating her very being. The old man simply looked in muted shock, with blood staining his glasses, as he watched Claire fall back, screaming in pain. The bullet hit her straight between the index and middle finger, tearing them off of her hand and prying what remained of her knuckles wide open. Her hand was now literally split in two. _"Got you now…" _he thought, as he could feel his heart begin to slow its pace, knowing full well that the danger was already nearing an end. Still shaking, the old man got on his feet, his left hand pressed over his open wound, and his right still holding Claire at gunpoint.

"Now, let's get this over with…" he told her in between his exhausted panting. With another deep breath, he slugged Claire over the head with the handle of his gun, relishing the feeling of the cold, hard plastic cracking against her skull. "Stab me? Stab me?" he yelled as he repeatedly kicked her on the side and the back of the head.

'…you are under arrest, for attempted homicide, possibly for homicide…and for being a psychopathic bitch." He hissed, reaching for his portable radio.

"…You monster…why…" Claire whimpered, now on her side, crunched into a fetal position, cradling her torn hand by her stomach.

"…?"

"How could you do this?" she suddenly screamed, now in tears, both from the pain racking her body, and the resignation she felt in her failure. "We had a deal! We had a deal! Chris is mine! Chris is mine and you'll never take him away from me!" she then continued, straining her throat with the decibels of her voice. "Deal?" The old man took care not to lower his gun an inch this time around.

"…He's mine, he's mine and he's all alone and…he loves me! We're going to have a baby…" she then continued, already to the point of hysteria. "…that's how much he loves me!"

'Who had a deal with you?"

"…"

"Tell me!"

"…Jill."

"…" The old man's eyes were now hung in darkness, his features carved out like a stone statue. It was the appearance of a sadistic smile though, that made a shiver run down Claire's spine. The old man started chuckling, escalating to loud, horrifying, laughter. Claire could only look in confusion, as the man regained posture. "…Jill's really involved. Perfect. I get to bring all of you down…" he whispered to himself, barely audible to Claire's ears.

"…What?"

"…"

"Please…let me go…he loves me…I love him…doesn't that mean anything to you?"

"Stupid bitch…I don't give a fuck." The old man dryly responded, not showing a hint of emotion for the young woman's avalanche of emotion.

"…?"

"I don't care about your sick, little incest games… I don't care about the fact that I'm going to need a hundred stitches to stop my bleeding…and that after all we've been through, odds are the freak in your stomach is already dead…"

"…"

"…all I care about, is how you are Miss Claire fucking Redfield, and how bagging you, and exposing you and all your little S.T.A.R.S. buddies… for the crazy cunts that you people are, is going to make me famous."

"…"

"…No one will ever forget my name when I'm done with you, you little…" A gunshot suddenly cut the commissioner off. Claire's eyes widened in shock as she saw the back of the old man's head erupt as a bullet tore into his cranium, sending pieces of his brain flying forward. Without another sound, the old man crumpled to the ground, then falling face first to the pavement. "…" Claire's eyes focused on the matter seeping from the old man's open skull, only snapping back to reality as she heard the footsteps of someone drawing near. Claire narrowed her red eyes, trying to decipher who the shadows hid.

"…you…" the young woman's agonized face then contorted into what could only resemble a smile, as she realized who had come to save her.

**Author's note: **Okay, so maybe not as thrilling as the Chris and Leon death match, but what can you expect from an old man and a pregnant chick? (Hate mail!) Anyway, hope that got you interested, as the mystery finally gets answered in the final chapter of the Rose and The Estuary. And for a hint of what to come…nah. See you in the next chapter!


	10. The Estuary

**Author's note: **This is it, the last chapter of the Rose and the Estuary. First of, I'd like to thank all of you who read this thing. I mean it. Anyone who could withstand my dazzling compulsion for verbose narrative should win an award. Anyway, without further adieu, let me present, the end of the river.

**Tek: **No big, thanks for the kind words.

**Chapter 10: "The Estuary" **

"Claire's dead." Aya got down on one knee and took a closer look at the pool of blood that Claire had left behind. She would have been lying to herself, if she would deny that she wanted the pleasure of bringing Claire down herself. She wanted to be the one to pull the trigger. To make Claire pay for hurting so many people. But deep down, she knew she wouldn't be able to. Not like this. "She really suffered." Aya muttered, as she got back on both her feet, watching the medics load Claire' corpse in the ambulance. "…Good." Commented a male voice that came up behind her. A voice she knew well. "You're not supposed to be out yet." She muttered as she turned around to face Kevin.

"Yeah, I know." He calmly responded, waving at the other officers who welcomed him back. Kevin wished that they would have seen him again under much, much better circumstances.

"Damn, I really wanted the old man to sign my sling…" he muttered as he kneeled beside the spot where the commissioner met his sudden death.

"Well, we can put 'in memory of' on it." Aya commented.

"Sounds like a plan."

"…Okay, so…" Aya turned and faced one of the CSI on the scene, who was busy trying to dislodge a bullet from the wall. "…what, Claire and the commish off each other?"

"Looks like it." He responded, raising the bullet to the level of his eye to examine it better. He was already old, well past his prime, but he still found passion in what he did. Not many people could say that.

"I'm pretty sure ballistics is gonna confirm it, but it looks like what killed the commish was a bullet from Claire's gun, while she bled to death, from a bullet that came from the commish's gun."

"So the commish turns around, not knowing that Claire still had some kick left in her."

"Maybe. Thing is, angle of the entry wound's too high. She couldn't have shot him from the ground. She needed to be on her feet to have done this damage."

"Marge retrieved this bullet from the commissioner's…the auto .45 that she stole from Kevin has special bullets specific to that gun. And this s it."

"So, that kind of makes the possibility of a third shooter pretty slim."

"Or maybe Claire dropped the gun, and someone picked it up."

"Pretty far fetch. Most people would run away from gunshots, not towards them. What's Claire's COD?"

"Well, numerous bullet wounds. One right to the thigh, pretty quick way to bleed to death."

"Her baby?"

"…There's also a wound track through her stomach. Nothing left of the baby."

"…What's that?" Aya then asked, pointing to the pavement. "Blood trail?"

"Yeah. Another thing. Claire bled to death here…" Hank answered pointing to right beside where he was crouching. "…but, she crawled. From there to here, she crawled."

"Escape?"

"Or quite possibly to someone."

"Someone standing."

"Someone who could shoot the commissioner from a level angle."

"…A third shooter."

"Damn." Kevin whispered.

"Odd thing is the bullet wound on the femoral artery, in her thigh, bled out the most. But judging from the size of her wound, it would have been impossible for her to crawl to where she did after sustaining the bullet wound."

"Okay. The weirdness continues." Aya commented.

"…Why didn't he call for back up?" Kevin asked, scratching the back of his head with frustration.

"That's what's bothering me." The CSI responded, begging the evidence and placing it in his field kit. "And does it bother anyone that Claire Redfield is dead?" He asked, making the two detectives realize that this forensics team had no idea about what was going on.

"Uh, yeah." Kevin quickly responded, glancing at Aya.

"…Maybe you and the CSI on the Leon Kennedy case can work on this together."

"…What Leon Kennedy case? There is a Leon Ke-"

"Yeah."

"Why is there…Leon's dead?"

"Uh-huh."

"And no one bothered telling any of us? Wait, who's in the loop here?"

"You know the protocol on our alpha cases, Hank." Kevin interrupted.

"…"

"If anyone of political or military is in terminal condition, then we keep a media blackout…"

"…so no one grabs advantage and whacks him or her in his or her weakened state." The CSI finished, rubbing his temples.

"Well, cat's out of the bag. They'll be expecting word from Chris soon." Aya remarked, shaking her head in frustration. It made the CSI turn and raise an eyebrow. "Why? What's with Chris? Is he dead too?"

"No. He…he is the reason there's a media blackout on the case. He's in a hospital. Heck, it's so top secret the media doesn't even know there's a blackout. All everyone knows is that key personnel are taking private vacations." Kevin responded.

"…God." Hank uttered under his breath. "Is there anyone else involved?" he then asked.

"No, not that I, what do you mean involved?"

"Well, there's the siblings, Chris and Claire Redfield, and like you said, Leon Kennedy's gone, and we all know he and Claire had a thing going…so who else is missing from the picture?"

"Jill. Jill Valentine." Aya immediately answered. "Jill…Emily said that Jill was regularly called by both Chris and Claire."

"And it looks like she's the only one still standing." Kevin added.

Chris' eyes bolted open, his entire body covered in sweat. He had just awoke from a frightful dream. And yet he knew, for some reason, that his terror wasn't over. And as the as fragments of his nightmare slipped from his memory, he slowly began to make out a figure sitting in the darkness. "Who…" He thought it was the commissioner at first, since the old man was the only person who ever came to his room, but it didn't take long for him to make out the silhouettes features. It was a woman's.

"Did you miss me, sweetheart?" Jill asked, leaning forward just so that the moonlight that pierced through the windowpane managed to illuminate her face.

"Jill…oh, God." Chris tensed as he looked at the snow white face.

"Long time."

"…I tried to protect you."

"Thanks for that. Appreciate it."

"…What are you doing here?"

"Well, duh, I'm here to finish what Leon started. Well, what Claire started. Oh, you get the idea."

"…"

"Have to admit, these top secret hospitals? Should be a little more maintained. Oh, and if you have any suggestions on how you want to die, you'd better let me hear it now."

"Don't do this."

"Oh, sure, I'll pack up and leave right now."

"…" Chris moved as slowly as he could. His left side was concealed from Jill, and beneath the bedpost, was the button to call for security. "What do you plan to accomplish by doing this? We've known each other for years!" he asked her, as he reached the button and immediately pressed it as hard as he could.

"…Does how long matter? How long since Claire realized she got all wet thinking of you?"

"…"

"How long since she found out about me, and threatened to turn me in?"

"…I stopped her. For you."

"Well, sorry hon, but I just can't risk it. Besides, I can tell you enjoyed 'stopping her' as much as you could."

"I love you. Jill, please…I've never told anyone about what you…"

"I'm bored. Kill you now."

"What was the deal?" he suddenly asked, in an attempt to buy himself more time.

"Hmm?"

"You needed something to keep her quiet, at least until before you could come here and…what's the deal?"

"…You. She keeps my secrets, I find a way to make her keep you."

"…what do you mean? How?"

Emily quickly scattered the files on the squad room desk, with Aya, Kevin and Hank in attendance. "Okay, everything we know." She started, opening a file right in front of her. "You okay, Em?" Aya asked before the secretary proceeded with the low down. "Ask me again when we solve this case." She responded. Though her eyes were still red from the tears she spent, she still soldiered on. "These are Chris Redfield's phone records. Two main points of interest, one the airport, that the shadow CSI team managed to trail."

"And what did they find?" Hank asked.

"Says here that he was headed for Argentina." Kevin answered, pointing at an encircled word on the file that Emily read.

"Isn't that where Jill retired?" Aya asked.

"Yeah. But the airport isn't American. It's north of the border." Emily responded.

"Shit. With our current ties to Canada, it's going to take months to secure our guys on their land. Even asking for their airport to stop Jill from leaving is gonna be impossible. And since the borders no longer have patrols…"

"Then we stop her before she gets across."

"Continuing on, the second point of interest was this, more than sixty phone calls, all to Jill Valentine's number."

"More than thirty?" Kevin raised his eyebrow. "Had to be important."

"Or you had to be obsessed." Hank followed.

"…next, second folder." Emily put the first folder down, still keeping it open, and reached for the one to her left. "These are Claire's."

"Again, calls to Jill." Kevin mentioned.

"Yeah. Only a handful to Leon. There are more for Chris." Added Hank.

"Isn't that weird? I mean, she calls her brother, what, a dozen times in less than a week, but doesn't even talk to her fiancée as much?" asked Aya, placing her hand on the table.

"Well, they did live together." Hank reasoned, though he himself wasn't sure of that truly was the reason.

"Still, I mean, when…" Kevin glanced at Aya. "…well, when it was you and me, we called each other all the time, even when we shared an apartment."

"…Maybe they didn't express themselves the way we did."

"…"

"Look." Hank pointed at the last call. "This was just an hour before Leon was found dead, right?"

"Yeah…" Kevin looked closer at the file. "…and Claire made a call to Jill right after."

"And then Jill called Chris, maybe half an hour before the estimated time that Leon went Rambo in the Redfield residence." Aya followed.

"Now, don't tell me the shadow CSI didn't notice that." Hank remarked, taking the file.

"What's the shadow protocol again?" Kevin asked.

"In a case that could possibly involve the government, they're the ones who run the scene, sending info to the top brass." Aya answered.

"Meaning the feds." Kevin connected,

"And only one person in the precinct. Namely the commissioner of police." Hank added.

"So we've been running around like headless chickens, all the while the feds are already solving the case?" Kevin asked.

"Pretty much." Emily responded. "But the commissioner had full rights to the evidence that was found, and well, he left it to you guys."

"…What, you mean he expected to…you know?" asked Hank.

"I don't know. Maybe it was just a precaution." Emily answered.

"So these folders…" Kevin pointed, referring to a pile of unopened ones.

"Are the ones that were meant for the commissioner to see." Aya finished, immediately picking one up and turning it open. "Okay, documentation on the evidence in the scene."

"You think the feds are gonna be okay with us taking a peek?" Kevin asked Aya.

"Just let them try and stop us."

"…Okay. So what do we have?" Hank interrupted, walking over to Aya.

"Huh, look, there's a tox report. On Leon. And on Chris."

"Tox reports are pretty standard. Here, let me…" Hank reached for the file and began to read. "…okay…well, basically, Leon's been drugged up with more amounts of amphetamines than even a depressed stoner could stomach. And Chris, well, Chris is squeaky clean."

"Leon, no. Not Leon. I knew Leon for years, and I swear on my grandmother, he never touched any bakes." Kevin immediately rebutted.

"Do you think we could trace where these drugs came from?" Aya asked.

"Wait, wait, wait, let's get back to Claire." Kevin interrupted.

"What about? She's dead. Good riddance." Aya replied.

"No, I mean, when, I was going to escort her back to her place, right, back at the beginning before she went 'Natural Born Killer' on me. She…it's not like she felt anything."

"Felt…How exactly?"

"She, she was like, calm. I mean, really, really calm, not even a single tear. I'm no psychologist but should she be at least in shock that her fiancée for died? Or like, signs of some inner turmoil?"

"Maybe she was hopped on valium." Emily suggested.

"Nah. I've seen girls on val, they still look like the life got sucked from them."

"So we're going on your hunch here, Kevin? That you somehow have an ornate understanding of human behavior?" Hank asked.

"Stop it." Aya chided.

"…Okay, so what else we got?" Kevin asked.

"Huh. Looks like the commish had a lead, gave it to the CSI before he died."

"What's that?"

"Uh, 'Check the paintings'."

"What do you mean?"

"…Drugs. They found drugs hidden behind some sort of lock in Chris' home. Same drugs in Leon's system. Says here that they needed to press some switch behind the paintings in the order from birth to death…the theme of the paintings."

"Huh. You don't hear that everyday." Aya commented.

"RPD had doors locked by pressure sensitive panels. Really not that unusual." Kevin reminded.

"You Raccoon City people are weird, you know that, right?"

"Yeah, especially the part when everyone we knew died, and well, undied."

"…And one more thing." Hank interrupted. "They found a small, granite like substance, unidentified since this report."

"They've got a picture?" Kevin asked.

"No need. It's still in evidence. Maybe we can get our guys to look at it."

"Guys." Emily interrupted, showing them a report on another file. "Looks like these shadow guys are pretty extensive."

"What do you mean?"

"…Uh, looks like everything had to be processed, even if they didn't really seem to be part of the case. You know, big picture thing."

"Well, what did they find?"

"Some of Claire's…clothes…tested positive for semen."

"Well, Leon and her must have…"

"Chris' semen."

"Oh."

"That's…" Aya turned to hank for a proper answer.

"Sick." He concluded.

"Any idea where Chris is now?" Kevin asked.

"…Here. I think it's where the commish must have been headed." Hank pointed.

Aya kicked the door open, scanning the room with her gun at the ready. "Oh fuck." She uttered as she found Chris, who was already discolored, motionless on his bed. "Hank!" she called, her eyes landing on the red stains on his white blanket, seeping from beneath his genital area. Chris' face was contorted in a permanent mixture of both pain, and desperation. "You think he's…" Aya closed her eyes and shook his head, recalling the numerous dead orderlies that they had just passed. "…damn, body count's up to eight." Hank remarked, propping beside Chris' corpse. "How'd he go?"

"Well…" Hank raised the white blanket, taking a look at where the blood came from. "…huh, he got neutered. But that's not enough to kill someone…at least not when the body is still this warm."

"Okay. Hey, red marks. Right below the cheekbones."

"Then from initial investigation, the COD is asphyxiation. Huh. He cried."

"He what?"

"…Tears."

"Is that like, some reaction?"

"Not unless he was choking."

"Well his junior did pop open."

"Right."

"…Think Jill did this?"

"Not a big handprint."

"…"

Kevin kept his hand on the end of his holster, watching the bellboy unlock the hotel room door. He had three other officers behind him, also ready for the worst of it. Time seemed to slow down as the bellboy turned the key, and took it out as soon as he heard the click. "Let' go." Kevin instructed as he pushed the door open with his elbow, then immediately training his gun at the area for the sight of danger. The three other uniforms quickly poured inside, each one checking a room for signs of hostility. It wasn't half a minute more before Kevin heard his men shout off that the place was clear. The suite really was worth the price of admission. The door led to a small corridor that veered off into three directions, to the left was the kitchen, to the right was the bedroom and shower, while straight ahead, where Kevin was, stood the sofa set to his left, and a dining table to his right. The kitchen was only a few feet away from the dining table, with only a waist high partition separating the two areas.

"Stuff's still in here." An officer noted as he came out the bedroom. "She left in a hurry?" asked another. The two other cops made their way to the living room where Kevin was, while another kept outside the corridor leading to the bedroom, his back turned to the door leading outside.

"…Or could be she's coming right back." Kevin said, as he took out a white handkerchief from his pocket and picked up a plane ticket that was lying on top of a coffee desk. "At any rate…she'll be needing this to leave." He said, putting it back down on the kitchen counter. A second later, his radio began to static, and since his right arm was still in a sling, he had to re-holster his gun to answer it.

"Ryman here."

"Hey, it's me. Chris is dead." Aya reported.

"Damn. How?"

"Asphyxiated. And his penis got torn off."

"Oh fuck. Are you shitting me?"

"I shit you not."

"…Remind me not to piss her off when I kick the crap out of her."

"I'll send you a memo. Anything on your front?"

"Found her plane ticket."

"…"

"Aya?"

"…"

"Aya!"

"…"

"Aya, are you there?"

"Good evening, officer Ryman." Greeted a female voice, different from Aya's.

"…Who is this?"

"I'm here to help."

"Who…how did you get this frequency?"

"You have yet to connect the dots." She whispered. The woman had a Chinese accent that clung to her English, with a voice that sounded like spiders crawling down your skin.

"What? If you have something to-"

"Claire didn't love Leon."

"…"

"She loved her brother."

"…"

"And Chris didn't love Claire."

"…"

"He loved Jill."

"…How do-"

"I know, because I love Leon."

"You're…"

"They're coming."

"What?"

"Kevin!" interrupted Aya's voice, as the frequency suddenly cleared from the invader.

"Uh…"

"Kevin, do you hear me? What happened, are you all right?"

"…Aya, I…I think I just talked to-"

"Kevin what is-" but before Aya could finish her question, she suddenly heard the man from the other line yell. Half a second later, rapid gunfire erupted, and then the line went dead. "Oh shit." Aya turned and found Hank staring at her. "We've got it covered here. Go." He calmly suggested, gesturing for her to make her way. "…Okay. Loeb! Miller!" Aya called to the two uniforms backing her up.

The officer with his back to the door was immediately struck by a hail of bullets, killing him almost instantly. It was enough, however, to give his team mates the time to duck for cover. Two masked men with Uzis stepped inside, spraying the room with gunfire. A third man was behind them, also holding a firearm, but not partaking in the violence. Kevin dove to his right, ignoring the pain that burned through his arm as it struck the floor. The two other uniforms made it to the opposite direction, out of harm's way. "Come on!" One of the armed men called as he quickly made his way to the kitchen, which had a nice, full view of the dining table. "Oh fuck." Kevin saw the man enter the kitchen, still blindly firing in their general direction.

With a deep grunt, the detective kicked the round, dining table down and used it for cover, just in time as the bullets came down on him. All the while, the third man, exiting the bedroom with a luggage of Jill's belongings, came from behind the shooter stationed in the kitchen, and grabbed the plane ticket that Kevin left on the kitchen counter. "I've got everything." He remarked, as he doubled back and left the room. One of the uniforms tried to aim at Kevin's assailant, but the kitchen's corner pillar managed to cover him from his aim.

"Godda-" All of a sudden, the second armed man dove right into the middle of the living room, rolling as he hit the ground, but not standing up. Before any of the two uniforms, or even Kevin could react, the man immediately sat up, drawing two pistols from inside his jacket, aimed into both directions. "That's a-" Kevin bit his lower lip as he instinctively fell back, right as the man started to fire. It saved him. But the two other officers weren't so lucky. As the man kept his eyes on the two other men, possibly those that he thought to be more dangerous, Kevin immediately adjusted himself so that his back was flat on the ground, with his legs bent underneath, just so that the other shooter with the Uzi couldn't cripple him.

_"Die you fuck!" _Kevin, still on his back, returned the courtesy, and sent a bullet right through the man's eye just as he turned to look if his blind shooting hit its mark. "…I know that maneuver…" he grimly thought as he watched the man's body helplessly fall back. "Jeff!" he heard the other one cry out. _"Now!" _Kevin hoisted his legs up, and by using them as weights, crashed them down for the rest of his body to spring upward. "Wha-" the armed man didn't have the time to raise his Uzi for a second volley before he saw Kevin ready to finish him off. "Drop it."

"…"

"That was a John Woo! A fucking John Woo! That's a maneuver they only teach S.T.A.R.S. personnel!"

"…"

"Tell me who the fuck you are!"

"…"

"Are you with Jill? Are you a member of S.T.A.R.S.?"

"…"

"Answer me!"

"…How did you know? You're not…you're not S.T.A.R.S."

"…It's the only fucking thing I got right in the entrance exam."

"Jill taught us, trained us…wasn't supposed to be like this."

"Bodyguards? You're her bodyguards?"

"She was just supposed to shut Claire up."

"What do you mean?"

"Claire knew. Claire knew and now Jill is going to kill us all. Me for failing."

"…"

"And you for being here."

"Okay…that's enough. Drop the gun, now, or I end you." Kevin cocked his gun again, though he knew that killing this man meant killing the only possible they had to Jill, and her plans, that they had left.

"You have to work on your threats, kid." The man hissed, as he raised his Uzi in an attempt to salvage the situation. Kevin narrowed his eyes and pulled the trigger.

Jill hummed along Andrea Bocelli's stirring vocals as she sat comfortably inside her red Cadillac, watching the hotel room entrance on the other side of the street with an eagerness of a child on a Christmas morning. The guests were all steadily streaming out, some in a panic, others letting their curiosity force them to sway the hotel staff gently ushering them outside. _"Maybe next time I should invest on silencers." _She thought, as she watched one frantic, middle-aged woman suddenly collapse as she got to the street. _"…Nah." _It was a minute later that she found what she was waiting for. Her third man. Of course, his mask no longer covered his face, and his gun was safely kept inside his jacket. A smile crept up Jill's face as she unlocked the doors, so that her man could step inside. "Everything's there, Carlos?' she asked, knowing full well that she didn't need to. There was a reason after all that her third man never failed. "I should go back and check the room." He suggested, pushing back his long, brown hair. "Are you South Americans always so eager to make a girl smile?" Jill teased, as she locked the doors and hit the gas pedal.

Aya's heart raced as she ran up the hotel stairs, with Loeb and Miller at the same pace. The floor numbers flew by as they let their adrenaline carry them on, knowing full well that by the next day, none of them would be feeling their legs. _"69" _Aya made her way to the door and rammed it open. "What room was it?" Loeb asked as they stood in the middle of the corridor, with a plaque on the wall giving the directions of the room numbers. "Left." Miller noted, and Aya immediately bolted to the direction.

The armed man cried out in shock as Kevin's bullet shot the Uzi off of his hands, sending sparks and shrapnel that burned his hand. "Now, you come out of the kitchen with your hands behind you head." Kevin instructed, keeping his gun trained right between the man's eyes. "Fuck you." He hissed. "I said-" Kevin stopped as the man suddenly lunged at him, jumping straight over the kitchen partition and tackling the detective down. It would have probably hurt less if he didn't have numerous bullet wounds that were still healing. He didn't even have time to realize that the gun he carried slid off his hand as he hit the floor.

"Off me!" Kevin yelled, trying to cover himself from the man's fists with only one arm. Not that he expected shouting at him to work. He soon felt the larger man's hands make their way to his neck. And they began to squeeze. "Kill you, kill you, kill you…"

"Not today." Interrupted a woman's voice. The man turned just in time to see Aya's heel crash intro his face, sending him off the tired police officer.

Loeb checked on the two other uniforms. "Hey, hey, Evans is still alive!" he notified, as he started to apply pressure on the unconscious man's wound. "Jesus, what happened here?" Miller asked as he radioed for the medics to follow. "Kev?" Aya helped the detective to his feet, though her eyes were still kept on the man shriveling at the corner of the room. "I think I'll live." He whispered, the pain still raking at his voice. "You sure?"

"I'll let you know if I die. You get to read my diary."

"Diary?"

"Journal, I said journal."

"Detective!" called an officer, and both Kevin and Aya turned with weary faces. "One of the units we set up on the toll gate on the north expressway. Saw Jill."

"Shit, she's leaving. Kev, stay with this guy, I want him to live to see his day in court."

"And you?"

"We're going after the higher power."

It was half an hour later. The man sat in the interrogation room, his hands cuffed, as a limp Kevin, stood in his front. "You think you know…" whimpered the man. "…but none of you do. What it's all about." His eyes shifted into every direction, his hands trembling violently. "Well, I think I have a pretty good guess. Someone…someone tipped me off. Told me that you guys were coming. And a few other interesting things."

"…"

"Chris loved Jill. Claire loved Chris. Leon loved Claire."

"…"

"According to the files the commissioner last wrote, and the tox reports, Leon had high amounts of very unstable amphetamines. Same thing found in Chris' house. But I'm thinking, Chris wasn't a dealer, or else we would have found out. Neither was he a druggie because the tox reports on him came back negative for anything. But we can't trace where the drugs came from, since God knows amphetamines are everywhere, right?"

_ Jill felt her heart beating faster as she drove to the airport. Everyone told her that she should never ignore her instincts. The same instincts that saved her life for countless times. Right then and there, everything inside her screamed to turn back. That by then, they would have known where she was headed. Back home. To her last escape. _

"Wrong. You see, this case is priority one. That means that we've got every nut job in the precinct, from a man who knows every kind of cheese there is, to one that has a thing for armadillos. Fucking armadillos. And you know what the armadillo guy told me? That there was a small, very, very small, cut off, sharp edge that they found clinging on one of the plastic bags that carried the drugs. Belonged to Chlamyphorus truncatus. The Pink Fairy Armadillo. Endemic in Argentina. Specifically in dry grasslands."

_ That was when she saw it. In her rearview mirror. A see of red and blue lights emerged from the horizon she just left behind. Red, the blood and sacrifice every man had to make in order to stand up for what's right. Blue, the satisfaction, the pride, and joy, of being there for who and what you love. The colors of heroes. Men and women who risk their lives in the name of what they believed in. Heroes. And they came for Jill. _

"Yeah. Same place that Jill came from. So, we've got drugs, possibly coming from Jill, needed to be pumped from Leon's stomach. Enough to make him go crazy. Then, someone goes ahead and pisses him off more. But Leon wasn't going to kill Chris. At least he wouldn't be able to. Not in his incoherent state. Not with all his military know how getting drugged out of his system. Because that wasn't the deal, was it? Jill tipped Chris off, giving him a heck of a lot of time to send his security boys out for a snack. It was perfect. It really was self-defense. But Chris thought that Jill tipped him off because, well, because of emotion."

_ The highway was wide, wide enough for the other cars to notice the swarm of police cars coming from behind. Wide enough for them to move out of harm's way. Wide enough for Jill to speed through, singled out, the only enemy left. "No, fucking way." Jill hissed, as the man on the passenger seat beside her took out his gun and held it tight. _

"Not the case, was it? So what could make Jill, come out of her hole, her safe little hole, come out here, and orchestrate the crime of the century?"

_ From above, a halo of light began to sweep the streets, searching left and right for its target. And it didn't stop. Soon, Jill began to see a bright light bouncing off of her windshields .It was beautiful in a way, blurring the streetlights into yellow tails of illumination. Surreal. Just like the whole situation was. _

"I'm thinking she was blackmailed. You see, Chris called Jill every waking second of his days. Pretty long calls too. But I don't think it was about anything other than how much he loved her. Heck, we've found records of him Fedexing her rings and necklaces to her residence in Argentina. Now, how do you think Claire felt about that?"

_ Aya led the pack, her eyes set on the vehicle housing the woman who nearly caused the ruin of all their lives. Someone she has not even met. Only read about. A legend. A murderer. She didn't think that she could ever be this calm in a case as big as this .But she was .Because she knew, then and there, who the real hero was. _

"Sick to the stomach? The person you love, existing, living solely for someone else? You having to spend your Saturday night alone, knowing full well, that in some five class restaurant, the person you love is having time of his or her life with somebody special. That you spend your entire day thinking of him or her, and the person you fry your neurons for, doesn't even remember you're alive. Must have hurt. So we're thinking, what if you find out something bad about this person. That the person the love of your life loves, is doing something that could land him or her in jail.Claire found something out about Jill, didn't she? What if she, I dunno, discovered that Jill actually, say, dealt drugs, and threatened to expose her? What would the deal then be, to make sure she shut up?"

_"Bonnie and Clyde." Jill whispered to herself with a sad smile. "What was that?" the man beside her asked, but she no longer replied. He didn't ask again. "You know how people make Bonnie and Clyde out to be some glamorous couple, devil may care?" she asked. "Pack of lies." She uttered, chuckling under her breath. "But they did love each other." she then said, letting out a soft sigh. "They really did." _

"Give Chris to Claire. That was the deal.It was a sacrifice Chris had to make out of love, for Jill. But Claire wanted more. She wanted to keep Chris forever. To be hers and hers alone. That's why she drugged Leon, with the merch that Jill handed her. They knew that Leon would do just enough damage to send Chris to ICU. Enough damage for him to legally need a guardian for the rest of his life."

_"People, they always throw the word 'love' around, don't they?" Jill then asked. The man remained silent. Anxious. "Don't you think so?" she asked, keeping her voice at level sound, just above the screeching sirens that haunted them. "With all due respect Jill, I don't think this is a good time for us to philosophize love." he responded, turning to look at the sea of red and blue behind them. "Then when is?" she followed, raising her eyebrows. _

"But your boss, she doesn't take too kindly to being threatened. Because God knows, if Claire could squeeze this from her, she could do ask for bigger things down the road. So Jill double-crosses Claire. Plants the wrong evidence, being the drugs, in Chris' place, so it looks like he was the one who drugged Leon. And after that highly publicized fallout between the two back in '09. She didn't even have to think up of a motive for Chris having to kill Leon."

_"Passion." She muttered. "What?" The man turned and gave Jill a look of confusion. "The things we do. The reasons we do them. Passion. It's what makes us do the things that our brains wouldn't want us to do. What makes us betray our rational minds. Because you know why?" Jill stopped for a moment and glanced at the man. "We are all born evil." _

"Now you see Claire, she isn't big on the mind games. Not like Jill is. She wasn't ready for a double cross, and when it happened, when Chris turned into a suspect, she lashed out. Shot me a couple a times, and tried to find her way to where Chris was. Where Jill knew she would go. But Jill, couldn't kill Claire, at least not yet, because someone beat her to the punch. Claire encountered the commissioner. Jill had to wait, until both of them were out of it, before she could strike. You see, ballistics went ahead and told us that no third gun was used. But we don't think she needed one. Maybe, just maybe, during their fight, Claire dropped her gun. And Jill managed to find it. Now, when the commissioner cornered Claire, Jill knew that she could start talking any second."

_"Passion, from the people who teach us, who care, who love us, these are the things that gradually cover our true selves. Passion makes us human. Without it…we're just animals." Jill said, her eyes back on the long, endless road. "Animals ready for the slaughter." _

"So Jill shoots the commissioner from behind."

_"So tell me. I'm dying to know. How much passion do you have?" she then asked, to which the man could find no answer. "Enough to let your true self show? Or enough to let you do what's right?" It wasn't a question. It was a challenge. A test to see if one man's devotion meant the end of his life. "…I'm no animal." He hissed back, earning him a wide smile. And for him, it was reward enough. _

"And Claire, well, she couldn't have known that Jill was the one who set her and her brother up. So she crawls to Jill, asking for help. Now at that point, Claire was probably too weak to even hold a gun. So Jill drops the .45 that she picked up, goes over to the commissioner, and picks up his gun."

_The man leaned in between the driver and passenger seats, right to a rather large, rectangular box that was stuffed in the backseat's legroom ."I'm ready." He told her, taking off the lid and reaching intro the darkness inside. _

"It's what she uses to shoot Claire. Through the thigh. To make it look like she bled to death. And with Claire gone, Jill finished the last person who could tie her to it all. Chris. Now, a lot of this is just conjecture, but I'm pretty certain that I hit a few bases right. What do you think?"

"And why the fuck are you people telling me all this?" the man Kevin was interrogating asked.

"Because you're the one who is gonna drive the nail through the coffin."

"And how do you work that out, detective?"

"Testify against Jill Valentine, and we make sure that you be very comfortable. You haven't killed anyone yet, not like your buddy Jeff who offed two good, decent men. Testify against Jill, and you'll be remembered for decades to come. Cuz, in the end, isn't that what it's all about?"

"...You'll never catch Jill."

Aya furrowed her brows as she watched a man jump from the passenger seat of Jill's car, his hands clutching something against his chest. He landed hard, rolling for a few seconds before stopping. He was just a short distance away, and that was why Aya quickly realized in horror, and as he slowly stood, to regain himself after possibly fracturing his bones, he looked the oncoming wave of steel head-on, and smiled. "Holy mother of God…" Aya grabbed her car radio and began to transmit to all units. "This is Aya Brea to all units, there's a man who just exited Jill's vehicle, and he has a grenade launcher on him!" she yelled. And as she did, she saw the man raise his weapon high, and with a grin and a death wish, the man opened fire. From the distance, it was like the man fired off a flare that didn't shine, flying high up in the air. Ready to land into a massacre.

"Christ!" Aya swerved to her left, knowing full well that not everyone behind her could move as fast as she did. And she was right. The grenade landed right beneath the following car, and the explosion not only tore through it, killing both Loeb and Miller instantly, but it also sent the vehicle flying backward, crashing into the one that was behind it. As a small ball of fire erupted into the dark blue night, Aya couldn't help but feel that the death of four men was all thanks to her moving out of ham's way. Some of the other police cars swerved too far to the sides, one of them crashing right into the concrete highway's barricade. The sudden impact on its left side made its back spin uncontrollably to the right, hitting another car's side with the force of a wrecking ball.

Just as Aya turned once again to the road in front, she saw the man fire another grenade, this one spearing itself right through a police car's windshield, on the opposite side of the road from her. She wished she didn't get to see the panic in the female officer's face as she and her partner realized that the grenade landed on their backseat, right before it went off, mangling metal and body. The car behind it swerved to the left to avoid hitting the wreckage. 'For Jill." The man whispered to himself as he loaded another round into his launcher. "You all die." He let off another shot, this time straight at the mass of incoming steel, intent on crushing him in his own madness. Another explosion. Another car toppling backward. Two more lives lost.

The man kept his ground as Aya' car came up to his right, just a few feet away. _"Okay you psycho…" _Aya pressed her hand on the console and pulled all the windows down through the buttons. The man did as he was trained, locking in on the nearest threat, and taking care of it the only way he knew how. For a moment, his and Aya's eyes locked, and never have each other found such passion in a stare. Aya quickly spun the wheel to the right, locking the two front tires, and letting the hind two swing in a circle. At the same time, the man opened fire, just as she turned the wheel, and the grenade flew right into the front seat window. Aya quickly grabbed her seat recliner and pulled it up, letting her left back down. Her plan worked. She watched the grenade fly right above her, and exited through the open backseat window. A second later, the car's tail, in full swing, smashed right into the man, sending him flying to his left. Another patrol car hit the brakes, just as the man crashed into the hood, rolling onto the windshield and nearly shattering it into pieces.

Jill hit the brakes as well, stopping with her back in the direction that Jill sped away into. The other cars stopped as well, as the two officers driving the patrol car that the man crashed into stepped out and pulled their guns out. "He alive?" Aya asked as she peered out the window, still panting from the rush she just had. "…More or less." Responded a female officer, who radioed in for medical assistance. "Keep him alive. We're going to need him." Aya remarked.

"What about Jill?" another officer asked.

"…There's no way we can reach her before she crosses the border. At least not in the state we're in."

"Checked on Morrison and Quitely. They're banged up, but they'll make it." Another officer added.

"That's good." Aya responded, as she watched the sun begin to rise.

"So, what do we do now?"

"…Looks like we need to be rethinking our relations with Canada. At least we're still good with Argentina, right?" Aya stepped out of her car and let the wind caress her. It was a new day. "We'll catch her. Might not be now, but it'll be a cold day in hell before we let her get away with everything she did."

"…"

"But right now, I just want to see Kevin again."

**End**

**Author's note: **Didn't want to end it in a cliffhanger, but didn't want to give you guys a full sense of closure either, hehe. Blame CSI for the ending, I've been watching NY non-stop since it came out. Messer rules. Anyway, I hope I didn't leave any loose ends, and for all of you who went through this whole thing, big on the thanks. First time I tried something with the first half non-linear (and remarkably difficult to read) but I'm pretty happy with the way it all turned out. So to sum things up, Claire is a loon, Chris is in love, Jill is a sadist, and Leon was collateral. Well, hope you enjoyed the story, and for my next, I'm thinking of going back to writing an origin story. Until the next time, thank you, and good night.


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